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PRE-MILLENNIAL 

ADVENT OF MESSIAH 

DEMONSTRATED FROM THE SCRIPTURES; 

SPECIALLY ADDRESSED TO 

THE CONSIDERATION OF THE MINISTERS OF CHRIST. 

FIKST PRINTED IN THE CHRISTIAN OBERYER, 
AND NOW REPUBLISHED WITH CORRECTIONS AND ADDITIONS. 

THIRD EDITION*, 

C I 'j It 12) 

WITH 

A PREFACE, CONTAINING STRICTURES ON A TRACT 

ENTITLED 

" THE TIME OF CHRIST'S SECOND COMING IDENTIFIED WITH THE DAY 
OF JUDGMENT." 



By WILLIAM CUNINGHAME, Esq. 

OF LAINSHAW, IN THE COUNTY OF AYR. 



Therefore be ye also ready ; for in such an hour as ye think not the Son of 
Man cometh. — Matt. xxiv. 44. 

At midnight there was a cry made, Behold, the Bridegroom cometh. 

Matt. xxv. 6. 



LONDON : 

JAMES NISBET & CO., HATCHARD & SON, AND SEELEY & SONS ; 
EDINBURGH : WAUGH & INNES ; AND J. LINDSAY & CO.; 
DUBLIN: ROBERTSON & CO.; 
GLASGOW: JOHN SMITH & SON. 



MDCCCXXXVI. 



MACINTOSH, PRINTER, 
GREAT NEW STREET, LONDON. 



PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. 



A period of fourteen years has now elapsed since, in the first 
edition of my work on the Apocalypse, which appeared in 1813, 
I brought before the church the doctrine of the second personal 
advent of our Lord at the commencement of the Millennium, and 
his reign upon earth during that dispensation. Opposed however 
as these views were to the doctrine held in highest repute in the 
church, and unsupported as I then was in maintaining them, by 
any other commentator of the present day, I did not, either in the 
first or the second editions of my work, enter into the subject 
minutely. I was, indeed, well aware, that the mind of the 
Christian public was scarcely at that time prepared to receive even 
some distant hints of the nature of the dispensation, which I then 
believed to be rapidly approaching, and now believe to be at the 
door. Contenting myself, therefore, with a simple avowal of the 
doctrine wherever it occurred in the course of exposition, I 
purposely abstained from further details ; but in the Preface of 
my book, the sense in which I held the advent itself was thus 
explicitly acknowledged. 

" In the following work, the reader will find frequent mention 
of the second personal advent of our Lord. I am aware that it is 
the common doctrine of the present day, both among private 
Christians and the teachers of religion, to interpret in & figurative 
sense many of those passages which I suppose to refer to that 
great event. But I have the support of the greatest writers 
on prophecy in understanding them literally ; and the opinion 
which I now hold on this point, is not only the result of a long 
and most attentive consideration of the prophetical Scriptures, but 
was slowly and reluctantly formed in opposition to early pre- 
judices. In the continued prevalence of the opposite sentiment, 
we may discern the symptoms of that spirit of unbelief, which our 
Lord assures us, shall mark the season of his second coming : 

a 2 



IV PREFACE. 

Nevertheless, when the Son of Man cometh, shall he find faith 
on the earth ? ' * by which is meant not faith in the doctrines of 
his Gospel in general, but in the particular promises which relate 
to the second advent. 

" On this point I shall introduce the following quotation from 
King's ' Remarks on the Signs of the Times.' 

" On the one hand, the Jews would not apprehend nor believe 
the words of holy prophecy written concerning our Lord's first 
coming in his state of deep humiliation and suffering, being dazzled 
with bright apprehensions of what was written concerning his 
second coming, his coming in glory ; and on the other hand, the 
Christian world are now too backward to believe what is really 
written in the same words of holy prophecy concerning his second 
coming upon earth in glory, being blinded by their constant habit 
of contending against the Jews r chiefly for the former, and by the 
presumptuous mystical application which has taken place, by 
means of applying those holy words that relate to the latter* 
merely to the fancied prosperity of the Christian church on earth, 
though such a fancied prosperity is a misapplication of the words, 
in direct contradiction to all the warnings of our Lord himself, 
and his holy apostles." 

The time, however, seems at length to have arrived, when this 
primitive doctrine of the personal advent of Messiah, at the com- 
mencement of that glorious and now nearly impending dispensa- 
tion, wherein the saints of the Most High shall take the kingdom^ 
is no longer to be spoken in proverbs, but in the plainest and most 
intelligible language, in order that a sleeping church X may be 
aroused to deep and earnest inquiry respecting the signs of the 
stupendous events which are approaching. It has pleased God to 
raise up for the above momentous truth, many witnesses in the 

* Luke xviii. 8. t Dan. vii. 18. 

+ The parable of the Ten Virgins with lamps, Matt. xxv. 1 — 7, 13, 
manifestly describes the state of the professing church of Christ shortly 
before the advent. They all slumber and sleep — an alarm of the 
approach of the bridegroom is suddenly given, and they arise to trim 
their lamps ; while they are doing this the bridegroom comes. It 
seems to me, therefore, no breach of charity, to maintain that the 
church is asleep, as it respects the expectation of the coming of Christ. 
If, however, those who receive not the doctrine of the advent, would 
disprove our charge, let them refute the Scriptural evidence for the 
advent brought forward in the following pages. 



PREFACE. 



southern part of the United Kingdom. The doctrine itself is 
there making rapid progress, and is sounding forth in many 
pulpits. In Scotland, however, all appears to be still and at rest. 
Xo cry is heard — no alarm is sounded — not even a suspicion 
seems to lurk in the minds of the watchmen, that the morning 
approaches, and also the night;* and yet we should be apt to 
think that the evidence for the doctrine, is not of that scanty and 
contemptible nature, as to be passed over in silence. Assuredly 
it is easy to run it down under the appellation of the Millenarian 
heresy, or, Nicodemus-like, to ask, " How can these be ?" 
or to say, as some once said, " Are ye also deceived ? have any of 
the rulers or the Pharisees believed it ?"f But to meet and 
confute the Scriptural evidence upon which we assuredly believe, 
and confidently affirm, that if there be a second advent of Messiah 
promised at all to the church, that advent precedes the Mil- 
lennium, and introduces that dispensation of saving health and 
glory to this miserable world — to confute the Scriptural evidence 
upon which we hazard these assertions, will, we say, be found 
another matter, and, if we err not, of far less easy attainment. 

I shall now inform the reader that the circumstance which gave 
birth to the following Tract, was the appearance of a letter under 
the signature of D. D. in the Christian Observer for July last, 
which, after stating the divided state of opinion in the religious 
world, in reference to the Advent, concludes as follows : — 

" I am told that the expectation of a personal advent at the 
approaching crisis is rested by its advocates upon the following 
maxims as its foundation ; namely, that wherever a future advent 
or 7raaovfiOB, (Parousia) of our Lord is foretold in Scripture, the 
same advent is uniformly intended ; and that consequently, if in 
any one place the- advent intended be plainly a personal advent, 
the same construction must be put upon all. I shall be much 
gratified if any of your correspondents will take the trouble to 

* Isaiah xxi. 12, A glorious morning for the just, viz., that of the 
first resurrection — an awful night for the wicked. 

f I think this is the spirit of some papers which have appeared on 
the subject in some of the Religious Magazines of the day. No at- 
tempt is made to refute our views by Scriptural reasoning. The ap- 
peal is rather made to the principles of human reason and the authority 
of men. 

a 3 



vi 



PREFACE. 



inform me whether this be indeed the basis of the whole scheme 
of interpretation alluded to, and if so, on what proofs the rule of 
construction laid down in it is asserted and applied." 

In consequence of the request of this anonymous writer, I was 
led to draw up the paper which (having appeared in the above- 
mentioned periodical work) is now offered to the public ; and in 
republishing it as a Tract, I have not thought it necessary to divest 
it of its original form, but have simply made such corrections and 
additions as seemed to be calculated further to elucidate and 
strengthen the general argument. 

To the reader who is in no degree conversant with the subject 
of prophecy, it will doubtless appear that I have assumed in this 
argument certain positions which ought to have been proved. 
Now, to this charge I in part plead guilty. I have taken for 
granted certain first principles, but they are not of that nature that 
at this time of day I ought to be required to enter upon the proof 
of them. I suppose that no one can now be reasonably expected 
in any prophetic discussion to prove that the four monarchies of 
Daniel are the Babylonian, Persian, Grecian, and Roman. That 
the last of these was to exist in two different states, first as an 
undivided empire, and next as divided into ten kingdoms, among 
which was to arise an ecclesiastical power, (viz. the Popes of 
Rome), symbolized, Dan. vii. 8, by a little horn with eyes, and 
described also in St. Paul's prophecy of the man of sin, 2 Thess. ii. 
And further, that at the destruction of the Roman empire, secular 
and spiritual, in its last state, the Millennial kingdom of Messiah 
is to be established, signified in Rev. xi. 15, by the kingdoms of 
this world becoming the kingdoms of our Lord and his Christ. In 
the next place, no writer on prophecy can now be justly expected 
to enter upon the proof of the future and certain restoration of the 
Jews to the land of their fathers, and that this event is also to 
precede the Millennium. If then any of my readers shall feel 
disposed to quarrel with me, and to impugn my reasoning, because 
I have not proved these points, I must content myself with telling 
him, that among the students of prophecy, they are one and all 
considered as of the nature of prophetic rudiments finally settled 
and set at rest — no less so than the principles of gravitation and 
first elements of mechanics and chemistry are in the schools of 



PREFACE, 



vii 



human science.* Should the reader, therefore, require further 
information on these points, I shall refer him to the elementary 
treatises on prophecy, such as the works of Bishop Newton and 
Hurd ; and I shall also just mention a small volume by the Rev, 
Alexander Keith, " The Evidences of the Truth of the Christian 
Religion, derived from the fulfilment of Prophecy," which will be 
found replete with useful and interesting information. 

In sending forth the following Tract, I am rather actuated by a 
hope that it may excite to inquiry, than by an expectation that it 
will at once convince. I indeed feel that its reasoning is of that 
nature as not even to be understood by the careless and superficial, 
or without serious mental exertion and application. It also appears 
to me, that the species of conviction which is the result of an 
indolent and almost passive acquiescence in the arguments of 
another, is of little value. In order to a profitable acquaintance 
with truth, she must become the inmate of our understandings, 
and this she will not condescend to be, unless we importunately 
woo her approach by such an intimate converse as to show that we 
justly appreciate her friendship. Now, no branch of theological 
truth is in itself more worthy of being cultivated by those who have 
believed the Gospel, and are walking in its glorious light, than that 
which relates to the times and seasons of the Lord's second advent. 
This is indeed the great event, to which the expectations of the 
church are uniformly directed in the Apostolic writings. The 
church of our own times, generally refers her disciples to the period 
of death, as that of the consummation of their felicity. This is 
forcibly and justly expressed by Mr. Stewart, in his discourses on 
the Advent: — " If," says Mr. S. " we visit a Christian suffering 
under acute disease, how do we address him ? ' Be patient, my 
afflicted brother ; death will soon come, as a welcome visitor, and 
release you from all your pains.'' So if called to sympathize with the 
widow or orphan, we say, ' Dry up your tears ; in a little moment 
you will follow him ; — pursue but his steps, and death will come 
and take you to the land whither your friend is gone.'" Not so 

* Since this was written some of these first prophetic principles 
have been called in question by Mr. Maitland, of Gloucester, 
and certain ephemeral writers in our Religious Magazines. To 
Mr. Maitland I have replied in my " Strictures on the Rev. S. R. 
Maitland's Four Pamphlets on Prophecy, and In Vindication of the 
Protestant Principles of Prophetic Interpretation." 



viii 



PREFACE. 



the Apostles of the Lord. Under affliction they referred believers 
to the glory to be revealed — under sorrow for the loss of friends, 
they comforted them with the promise of that day, " When the 
Lord himself shall descend from heaven ivith a shout, and with the 
voice of the archangel, arid with the trump of God." When 
suffering from unjust oppression, they consoled them by the 
promise, that the coming of the Lord draweth nigh. So intently 
fixed were their minds upon that great event, that it forms the 
subject of their earnest enquiries, even before their Lord and 
Master was taken from them by his death upon the cross;* and 
it is the subject of the concluding prayer of the church of God in 
the volume of the Scriptures, " Even so come, Lord Jesus I" 

It is manifest also, that the times and the seasons of the first 
advent were not hid from the Levitical church, — else whence that 
universal expectation of the coming of the Messiah, which even 
Heathen historians testify to have filled the minds of the whole 
eastern world in the age of our Lord's appearance, and which the 
Gospel history no less clearly shows to have pervaded the whole 
body of the Jewish people. It was this knowledge of the times 
and the seasons, derived from the prophecies of Jacob and Daniel, 
that prepared the minds of Simeon and of Anna, of Nathanael, 
and all who looked for redemption in Jerusalem, to expect 
his appearance, and to welcome and receive him when he was 
manifested. Where then, we may well ask, is the unreason- 
ableness of the supposition, that a similar knowledge shall be 
vouchsafed to the waiting saints of- the New Testament church, 
to prepare their minds in like .manner for the second revelation of 
their Lord and Master from heaven, and to prevent them from 
being taken by surprise when he shall come ? " But ye, 
brethren, are not in darkness, that that day should overtake you as 
a thief. "\ 

It is the object of the following Tract to prove from the 
Scriptures that such knowledge is actually conveyed to us ; and 
that as the first advent of Messiah was according to Jacob's 
prophecy, when the sceptre was just departing from Judah, so his 
second advent is to take place when the sceptre is finally departing 
from the last of the four Gentile monarchies. But as it was with 



* Matth. xxiv. 3, 



f 1 Thess. v. 4. 



PREFACE, 



ix 



respect to the first advent, that while its tunes and seasons were 
so clearly revealed, that not only individuals, but nations were 
eagerly waiting for it, yet the precise year or day were hid under 
an impenetrable veil of mystery, till at length it was revealed to 
Simeon, just and devout, that he should not see death before he 
had seen the Lord's Messiah ; so is it with regard to the second 
advent, that while there are marks whereby we may assuredly 
know its near approach, yet of that year, or day, or hour, 
knoweth no man, no, not the angels in heaven. And if we,* 
who have watched every sign in the spiritual horizon for a long 
series of years, were now asked, " Is any sign of his coining 
yet unaccomplished?" we should be constrained to answer, " To 
our feeble view, not one sign remains unaccomplished. 'f If we 
were further asked, " Shall he come this year?" Our answer 
would be, " We know not" " Shall he come within the next 
twenty years?" Our answer would still be, " We know not; 
but this much we know and believe, that he is at hand, even at the 
door" All our knowledge, therefore, brings us just to that state 
of expectation and uncertainty which filled the minds of the 
waiting saints at Jerusalem, in the age of our Lord's appearance. 

Now, whatever may be thought of the conclusiveness of the 
reasoning employed in the following pages to prove the nearness 
of the advent, there ought, I should think, to be no difference of 
opinion upon the reasonableness of at least giving to the argument 
a fair hearing. And did the heart as well as the lips of the 
church in our days re-echo the words of John, " Even so come 
quickly, Lord Jesus ! " there would be little necessity for this 
pleading for a patient hearing of the evidence of his approaching 
advent, the very sound of which would be sweeter in her ears 
than the harps of cherubim and seraphim. But it cannot be 
denied that our doctrine is unpalatable to a considerable part 
even of the evangelical world. They, it seems, have received a 
revelation that the Lord is not to come for a thousand years ; and 
they will scarcely listen to us when we ask by what analogy of 
Apostolic declaration or expectation they support this cold repul- 

* I intend by the pronoun " we," the students of prophecy who have 
arrived at the conviction of the near approach of the day of the Lord, 
and are watching. 

f See Appendix, No. L 



X 



PREFACE. 



sive annunciation of delay, which but ill responds to the come 
quickly of the longing Bride, and as ill corresponds with every 
promise and every warning to the servants of God, and every 
denunciation of coming wrath and impending judgment to an un- 
believing world. 

We object to this common doctrine in limine, that it supposes 
the church in our days to be gifted with knowledge above the 
Apostles of our Lord. We challenge our opponents in argument, 
to produce one passage from the Apostolic Epistles ; to prove that 
the holy Apostles knew of the coming of the Lord to be even a 
thousand years distant from their days ; and if they knew not that 
which has since turned out to be true, but were kept in a state of 
uncertainty as to the period of the advent, where is the probabi- 
lity of supposing that a negative revelation should be given to us, 
which has, so far as believed, a direct tendency to neutralize all 
those indefinite assurances of the nearness of that day, and the 
consequent exhortations to watchfulness which are interspersed 
through the Apostolic writings. 

Leaving, however, these arguments from analogy to have their 
own legitimate weight, I remark in the next place, that if the 
direct Scriptural evidence and reasoning presented to the reader 
in the following Tract be false or unsound, they must admit of an 
answer from the Scriptures. I therefore invite my opponents to 
the amicable refutation of these views by Scriptural arguments. 

If, on the other hand, as I am firmly persuaded is the case, the 
doctrine itself be so entirely in harmony with the Scriptures, as 
that the argument in its favour possesses the most irrefragable 
strength, and is wholly unanswerable, then how unspeakably im- 
portant are the consequences which flow from it! for if the advent 
of the Lord be before the Millennium, then it may be so near 
at hand that a great proportion of the generation now alive upon 
earth may actually witness his appearing. And shall we be told 
that such a persuasion as this would produce no effect in awaken- 
ing the secure, in alarming and filling with terror such of the 
ministers of Christ as have been either slumbering or sleeping at 
their posts, or have been minding earthly things rather than 
heavenly? Are there then none such in our own days? Are 
there no ministers of the churches established by law, or of the 
various bodies of dissenters, who are feeding themselves and not 



PREFACE. 



xi 



the flock ? Are there none even who have among men the reputa- 
tation of preaching the doctrines of orthodox and evangelical 
truth, who yet> having learned these doctrines not by the teach- 
ing of the Holy Ghost, but in the schools and systems of men, 
are contented with setting before then* hearers a form of the truth 
destitute of life, and power, and unction ; and who knowing not 
the power of godliness, but resting satisfied with a lifeless mo- 
rality and decency, are manifestly far removed from that deep 
humility and self-denial, — that heavenly spirit, — that mortification 
to the things of time, — that ardent and divine charity which well 
become the servants of Him who upon the cross expiated the 
guilt of a lost world ! Now, if this inquiry into the times of the 
Lord's second advent should be instrumental in arousing from 
sleep, and transforming into an humble, spiritual, watchful, and 
laborious servant, only one of the ministers of Christ, it will not 
have been sent forth in vain. 

But I remark, in the next place, that a persuasion of the near 
approach of the day of the Lord cannot but have a powerful effect 
in giving new life, and energy, and efficacy, to the preaching even 
of those servants of Christ who have already, through the grace of 
God, been in the main faithful, yea, eminently faithful, in the 
discharge of their pastoral duties, both public and private, and 
who have with the greatest zeal preached Christ, and him crucified. 
Who is there of them who does not in secret mourn over his own 
leanness, and the small effect of his ministry, in turning sinners 
to Christ ? To you, then, brethren, we would say in the spirit of 
meekness, and love, and feeling our unworthiness to exhort you ; 
yet even to you we would with boldness say, — study deeply this 
subject, and we are hopeful, yea, confident, that you will arise 
from the inquiry no less deeply imbued with a conviction of the 
fallacy of those tales of a Millennium of happiness and purity in 
the absence of the Bridegroom, which constitute a large portion of 
the popular theology of this age, and with a lively persuasion 
of the near approach of the day of the Lord, and the advent of the 
Bridegroom. And say whether this would not give a more 
intense tone of solemnity and power to your denunciations of the 
wrath of God against all ungodliness, and unrighteousness of 
men ; and whether it would not infuse a new pathos, — a new ten- 
derness of spirit into your handling of the ministration of reconci- 



XU PREFACE. 

liation, while standing as it were upon the threshold of eternity, 
you pointed to the Cross of Christ for the last time, as the only 
refuge of a perishing world ! 

It is, moreover, evident that the matter cannot rest where it 
now is. In sending forth the doctrinal statement contained in 
these pages, we in effect controvert so large a portion of the 
traditionary expositions of the present day, that those who hold 
them must give to the subject their attention, and either show 
from the Scriptures that we have erred, or bend to the force of our 
Scriptural arguments, acknowledging that they have hitherto 
failed in declaring to the churches the whole counsel of God.* 

If any of our brethren should be displeased at the freedom 
which we have used, we shall request them to lend an ear to our 
apology, in the spirit of Christian meekness. We will tell them, 
then, that it is in the integrity of our hearts, and in the spirit of 
love to them, that we send forth this Scriptural argument. The 
author of these pages once thought as they now do, and was 
weaned from his early prejudices by slow and patient investigation. 
Believing as he now does, he dares not conceal his sentiments. He 
loves the approbation of his Christian brethren, but he loves more 
the approbation of his Lord and Master, who has warned him 
of the danger of hiding even his one talent from a sinful fear of the 
frowns and displeasure of his fellow-men. 

One word more and I conclude. Expecting, as I do, the per- 
sonal presence of our glorified Lord on this earth during the Mil- 
lennium, I yet attach to it no carnal notions of a personal and 
familiar converse with men in the flesh. The presence of the 
Lord may be manifested in a manner somewhat analogous, but 
far more glorious than by the display of the glory of the Divine 
Shechinah in the Holy of Holies. The declarations of his presence 
are express and unequivocal in the Scriptures, and time would 
fail me to bring them all before the reader. The special type of 
that dispensation is (I think) to be found in Jacob's ladder, as 

* The experience of five years has convinced me of the fallacy of 
this expectation. The greater part of the ministers of the churches 
in this part of the kingdom do so entirely dislike the subject of our 
Lord's Second Advent, that they will not give the argument even a 
hearing. In England it is otherwise. An eminent minister, who has 
lately received the doctrine, writes to me, that many of his brethren 
are coming to his views. 2d edit. 19th Sept. 1833. 

1 



PREFACE, 



xiii 



expounded by our Lord himself to Xathanaei. But without 
the knowledge of this doctrine, we conceive that not the prophe- 
cies of Balaam, of David, or Isaiah, of Ezekiel, or Zechariah, — 
not the typical signification of the Camp of Israel, nor of the 
Holy of Holies, nor of the reign of Solomon, nor of the Jewish 
feast of Harvest or Tabernacles can be fully understood, and a 
great portion of the Scriptures thus remains a sealed book. 

Without the presence of the Lord with the Millennial chinch, 
the glory of the Le\dtical dispensation would also, in so far as 
respects external manifestation, exceed that of the Messiah in its 
most perfect state upon earth, — so that the chronological argument 
brought forward in the following pages to prove the speedy advent 
of the Lord, though in itself sufficient to establish it, forms but a 
part of the mass of Scriptural evidence upon which we rest the 
general doctrine of Messiah's advent and reign, 

January 1st, 1828= 



PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION, 



In sending forth a second edition of this Tract, I shall take 
some notice of a Pamphlet published in Paisley to which my 
attention has recently been directed by an esteemed friend, a 
minister of Christ. Its title is, " The Time of Christ's Second 
Coming identified ivith the Day of Judgment, fyc. By the Author 
of Millenarianism Indefensible." 

The former Tract of the author, which has not come in my way, 
is so praised by those famous dealers in the ephemeral things of 
the spiritual world, the Religious Magazines, and also by the 
Scottish Guardian Newspaper,* that it is probable both Pamphlets 

* In a list of Books appended to the Second Tract, there are given 
seven testimonies — the number of perfection — to the merits of the 
former Tract, viz. : 1st, From the Scottish Guardian, 2d, The Pres- 
byterian Review, 3d, The Evangelical Magazine, 4th, The Presby- 
terian Magazine, 5th, The Christian Herald, 6th, The Orthodox 
Presbyterian, 7th, The Covenanter. I only regret that my limits do 
not permit my inserting the whole testimony of these seven Reviewers 
against the Literalists. 

Having, since I began these observations, procured and read the 
Tract, Millenarianism Indefensible, I shall, with respect to its author 
and his Seven Reviewers, hazard, almost without fear of contradiction, 
the following conjectures, viz. : That not one of these eight personages 
has ever read a page of the works, 1st, of Joseph Mede, 2d, of Sir 
Isaac Newton on Daniel and the Apocalypse, 3d, of Whiston on the 
Apocalypse, or, 4th, of Dr. Cressener on the same book. Perhaps 
the reading of some of them may have been extended so far as a part of 
the works of Bishop Newton. 

What forcibly strikes me in reference to this Tract, is the profound 
ignorance which it manifests of the whole subject which it treats. 
Doubtless the author is full of zeal. He would persecute this way 
unto the death ; Acts xxii. 4. But when will these men of zeal learn, 
that before they attack the Literal scheme, they ought to know what it is 
from the writings of its ablest advocates? There is not one of them 
who is aware of the powerful reasoning and profound erudition which 
are brought in aid of the Literal scheme in the writings of Mede and 
Dr. Cressener. 



PREFACE. 



XV 



may be widely circulated. The first Tract will be taken up by 
one every way competent for the task, I shall therefore confine 
myself to the second ; and in the following observations, I shall, 
for the terms, Millenarians and Anti-Millenarians, substitute as 
often as possible the words, Literalists and Spiritualists. 

The anonymous writer having confined his strictures very much 
to the works of Mr. Begg, although he has also done me the 
honour to pass some censures on a small Tract of mine, it becomes 
necessary for me to observe, that Mr. Begg is a writer of a very 
recent date on the Literal side. I have a high respect for him, 
and have been informed that his writings have been useful to 
many, though my own laborious avocations have not permitted me 
to make myself acquainted with more than a part of them. But 
yet, to prove that Mr. Begg has erred, is not to prove the body of 
the Literal school to have erred, since on certain points he has 
widely diverged from the sentiments of the greatest writers of that 
school. I will add, that upon some of the points which form the 
subjects of the strictures of the anonymous author, I myself 
differ from Mr. Begg. 

It is, as he says, for the purpose of rescuing the doctrine of the 
glorious appearing of our Saviour, from the low and paltry concep- 
tions which Millenarians have formed of it, that this author has 
taken up his pen. He tells us that " in the Scripture the doctrine 
of the second advent is uniformly associated with the day of 
judgment, or with the final, irreversible, and eternal destiny of all 
mankind." * On the other hand, he affirms that the views of the 
Literalists "lead inevitably to the conclusion, that a large portion 
of the ungodly who may be alive at Christ's coming, and all the 
wicked dead, except a few of the most flagrant transgressors, will 
be little affected by that event, because, if among the dead, they 
are not then to be raised, and though alive, they may not be of 
those who shall be destroyed — they may be introduced into Mil- 
lennial bliss and felicity — they may be ultimately saved. Indeed, 
with respect to the largest portion of mankind, those who 
have lived and died previous to the supposed pre-millennial 
advent of Christ, and who were neither righteous nor giants in 

* P. 6. 



b 2 



PTtEFACE. 



crime;* it is not easy to see — if the views of our opponents be correct 
— that the coming of our Lord will in the least degree affect them." 

After some further observations, he thus contrasts with the 
Literal scheme, which, as he imagines, has been placed by him 
in its true colours, that which he calls the orthodox view. 

" How much better does the orthodox view of this doctrine 
accord with the general tenor of Scripture on this subject ? In 
this view, the coming of Christ is an event of such transcendent 
importance, as to have an influence on our life as well as our 
death. Nor is its importance, or the necessity of making prepa- 
ration for it, in the least degree diminished by the consideration 
that it may not huppenfor upwards of a thousand years." f 

We, however, can discern no ground for the authority claimed 
by this anonymous writer, and the Religious Magazines, and the 
Scribes and Doctors of the present age, to stamp upon their own 
opinions the character of orthodoxy. Turning from these, whom 
we account blind guides, we fix our eyes on the Church in a 
better age, and we learn from her records, that ' the Literal, 
or Millenarian doctrine was "then universally counted orthodox^ 
Papias, who conversed with the disciples of the apostles ; J ustin 
Martyr ; Irenaeus, who was the hearer of Polycarp, the disciple of 
John ; Tertullian, and indeed all the Fathers before Origen,J as 
well as many in the following age, were Liter alists. Justin 
Martyr expressly affirms that he and all Christians who were 
orthodox in all things, believed in the first resurrection before the 
Millennium. § Even Jerome, who rejects the Literal doctrine, 
dares not condemn it. His words are, " Quce licet non sequamur 
damnare tamen non possumus quia multi virorum Lcclesiasticorum 
et Martyrum ista dixerunt." " Which things, though we follow 
not, yet we cannot condemn, since many Doctors of the Church 
and Martyrs have affirmed these things." 

Now, I ask this anonymous writer and his Seven Heviewers T 

* Certain of the Literal writers believe that some of the most wicked 
will be raised at the commencement of the Millennium. I myself 
have never arrived at that conclusion. 

f Tract, p. 11. 

X Even Dr. Hamilton of Strathblane admits this to have been the 
case. See his Work, p. 308. 

§ His words are Hyco £s u nvss u<riv o^oyvufiovts xccrac ravrot 
Xgitrnavot. Dialogue II. p. 313., Edit. Thirl. 



PREFACE. 



XVll 



what is the weight which attaches itself to their orthodoxy, when 
it is found opposed to the orthodoxy of the whole of the Primitive 
Church, as well as the sentiments of many of the deepest Scrip- 
tural students of later times ? 

Before going further, I must offer a remark in reference to the 
words in the passage last quoted from the anonymous Tract, which 
are printed in Italics. In these words the author is guilty of 
bearing that species of false testimony in favour of his own doctrine 
which consists in not telling the whole truth : for, according to 
this doctrine, it is not the exact truth, to say, that the coming of 
Christ " may not happen for upwards of a thousand years." He 
ought to have said, that " it shall asuredly not happen for upwards 
of a thousand years." 

The author of the Tract cannot certainly object to this correc- 
tion, or deny that it exhibits a fan- view of this part of his system. 
And we shall afterwards see that it cuts up by the very roots his 
main arguments against the Literal doctrine. 

At the end of his next paragraph (p. 12,) will be found the fol- 
lowing words : — " If we can succeed in showing by Scripture evi- 
dence, that the coming of Christ is inseparably connected or asso- 
ciated with the Day of Judgment, or with the everlasting destruc- 
tion of the unrighteous, as well as with the eternal blessedness of 
the saints, the whole question is settled." 

But that the coming of Christ is inseparably associated with the 
Day of J udgment is a truth held by us no less firmly than by our 
opponents. In showing this, then, the anonymous author settles 
nothing. In order to prove the truth of his own doctrine, it would 
be necessary for him to show further, 1st, That we and the whole 
Church of Christ in the first ages, have erred in placing the second 
advent at the destruction of the Fourth, or Roman Monarchy. 
2dly, That we err in holding the Day of Judgment to be com- 
mensurate with the Millennium. Now, he has not been so im- 
prudent as to attempt the proof of the first of these points. Like 
his brethren of the same school, he leaves it out of consideration, 
as if it had nothing to do with the matters at issue, whereas it is 
the main question upon which the whole controversy hangs.* So, 

* Dr. Wardlaw in like manner leaves out the consideration of this 
point in his Sermon on the Millennium. See my Review of his Ser- 
mon, Sect. IV. 

b 3 



xviii 



PREFACE, 



while he professes* to enter into the careful examination of the 
passage in Dan. vii. 9 — 14, which contains the only circumstantial 
annunciation of the second coming of Christ to be found in the 
Old Testament, he yet evades all explanation of what is intended 
by the coming of one like the Son of Man, with the clouds of 
heaven. He, indeed, afterwards offers a gratuitous assertion, that 
the -Son of Man does not require to come personally, either to com- 
mence or bring to a successful termination^ the war against the 
Beast. But does this writer, who. only two pages before, had in- 
formed us that matters of this kind are not to be " determined by 
names, however distinguished," and that "the question is, what 
saith the Scripture?" Does he — we repeat it — expect that we are 
to suffer this question to be determined by his authority, without a 
name, against the express assurance of the Written Word, that the 
Man of Sin is to be destroyed by the brightness of the Lord's 
(Uoc^ovtricc Parousia) coming, and against the whole authority of 
the Church of Christ in her best ages ? Surely this author, who 
so highly estimates the authority of his own sayings, will not, in 
his second edition, withhold from us the important secret of his 
name. 

As to the second of the above points, the proof of which is ne- 
cessary on the part of the author of the Tract, namely, that we 
err in holding the Day of Judgment to be commensurate with the 
Millennium, I find a great deal of desultory reasoning in his 
Pamphlet. But it seems all to resolve itself into one principle, 
viz. that the Millennium is too long a period for the Day of Judg- 
ment, and that the whole transactions of that day are to be de- 
spatched at once. 

The Day of Judgment, according to the Literal view, is that 
period of time when all things in the intelligent universe of God, 
which are now involved in disorder, shall be brought into com- 
plete order, all inequalities shall cease, all deformity shall give place 
to perfect beauty, all iniquity be destroyed, and be succeeded by 
perfect holiness. The very name given to it in the Scriptures, of 
the Great Day, may teach us the childishness of the common 
idea, that it is a day of twenty-four hours, or even any short 
period of time. This day, it is quite manifest, begins at the 



* Tract, p. 38. 



f Ibid. p. 45. 



PREFACE. 



xix 



sitting of the judgment of the Ancient of Days, in Dan. vii. 9, 
which was always by the ancient Church identified with the Day of 
Judgment. It equally begins at the sounding of the seventh 
Apocalyptic Trumpet, when great voices are heard in heaven, 
declaring, among other things, that the time of the dead is come 
that they should, he judged, and to give reward to the prophets and 
saints, fyc. Now, as these are things which confessedly belong to 
the last Judgment, we have here all the demonstration that can 
result from the express words of the Holy Ghost, that the Day of 
Judgment begins at the sounding of the Seventh Trumpet, which 
undeniably precedes the Millennium. On the other hand, it is 
equally manifest, from Rev. xx. 12 — 15, that the last act of the 
judgment, when Death and Hades are cast into the lake of fire, 
must refer to a time subsequent to the Millennium, even the same 
time when Christ shall, according to 1 Cor. xv. 26, having 
destroyed the last enemy, deliver up the kingdom to God, even 
the Father. Thus, then, when we go directly to the Scriptures 
to trace the limits of that day, we are compelled to conclude, that 
it includes in it the whole of that space during which our Lord and 
his saints reign ; when judgment (i. e. judicial authority,*) is 
given to them. And that this period is that of their reign, is 
further manifest from Dan. vii. 22. It is also the time, when the 
twelve Apostles are to sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve 
tribes of the children of Israel.f 

The sentiments of the illustrious Mede on this subject are 
briefly stated in the body of this Tract, but I shall here give a 
larger extract from the epistle there referred to : — " The Mother- 
Text of Scripture whence the Church of the Jews grounded the 
name and expectation of the Great Dag of Judgment, with the 
circumstances thereunto belonging, and whereunto almost all the 
descriptions and expressions thereof in the New Testament have 
reference, is that vision in the seventh of Daniel, of a Session of 
Judgment, when the Fourth Beast came to be destroyed; where 
this great Assizes is represented after the manner of the great 
Synedrion, or Consistory, of Israel, wherein the Pater Judicii% 

* K^ifAK. Potestas et facultas judicandi. — Schleusner. 
f Matt. xix. 28. Luke xxii. SO. 
X Supreme Judge. 



XX 



PREFACE. 



had his Assessors sitting upon seats placed semicircle-wise before 
him, from his right hand to his left." 

Again, he says, " From this description it came, that the Jews 
gave it the name of pi dv and Nm *wn DV The Day of Judgment, 
and The Day of the Great Judgment." 

Hence St. Paul learned that " the saints should judge the world" 
because it is said, that many thrones were set, and, ver. 22, by 
way of exposition, that " Judgment was given to the Saints of the 
Most High." 

" Hence the same Apostle learned to confute the false fear of 
the Thessalonians, that the day of Christ's coming was then at 
hand; because that day could not be till the Man of Sin was 
first come, and should have reigned his time appointed. Foras- 
much as Daniel foretold it should be so, and that his destruction 
should be at the Son of Man's appearing with clouds, whose 
appearing, therefore, was not to be till then, — 1 whom the Lord 
(saith he) shall destroy at the tmQama brightness of his coming,'" 

After some more observations Mede thus reasons : " These 
grounds being laid, I argue as followeth : 

" The kingdom of the Son of Man and the Saints of the Most 
High, in Daniel, begins when the Great Judgment sits. 

" The kingdom in the Apocalypse, wherein the Saints reign 
with Christ a thousand years, is the same with the kingdom of the 
Son of Man and the Saints of the Most High in Daniel. 

" Ergo, It also begins at the Great Judgment." 

Having next given reasons from the Scriptures proving that the 
kingdom in Daniel and that of 1000 years in the Apocalypse are 
one and the same, the learned commentator draws the conclusions 
which follow. 

" Now, if this be sufficiently proved, that the thousand years 
begin with the Day of Judgment ; it will appear further out of the 
Apocalypse, that the judgment is not consummate till they be 
ended; for Gog and Magog's destruction and the universal 
resurrection are not till then, therefore the whole thousand years 
is included in the Day of Judgment. 

" Hence it will follow, that whatsoever Scripture speaks of a 
kingdom of Christ to be at his second appearing or at the 
destruction of Antichrist, it must needs be the same which Daniel 
saw should be at that time, and so consequently be the kingdom 



PREFACE, 



xxi 



of a thousand years which the Apocalypse includes between the 
beginning and consummation of the Great Judgment. 

" Ergo, That in Luke xvii. from ver. 20 to the end. 

" And that in Luke xix. 11 to 15, inclusively. 

" And that in Luke xxi. 31, ' When ye see these things come 
to pass, know that the kingdom of God is at hand. ' See what 
went before, viz., ' The Son of Man coming in a cloud with power 
and great glory,' borrowed from Daniel. 

" And that in 2 Tim. iv. 1, ( I charge thee before God and the 
Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead at his 
appearing and his kingdom.' 

" By these we may understand the rest, taking this for sure 
ground, that this expression of the Son of Man coming in the 
clouds of heaven, so often inculcated in the New Testament, is 
taken from, and hath reference to the prophecy of Daniel, being 
nowhere else found in the Old Testament."* 

Having thus produced our Scriptural reasons for believing that 
the Day of Judgment is commensurate with the Millennium, we 
may confidently affirm, that if the anonymous author deny these 
reasons, his controversy is not with us, but with the text of Daniel 
and the Revelation ; for we have no apprehension whatever, that 
he can show that we reason inconsistently with the Scriptures. 

Such, then, being our view of the Great Day of Judgment, I 
observe, in the next place, that on the morning of this great day, 
we believe from the Scriptures that our Lord comes from heaven, 
raises his dead, and changes his living saints, who are both forth- 
with caught up into the air to meet him. He then poms out his 
judgments on the wicked, and afterwards in the day of Arma- 
geddon, he descends in flaming fire followed by his saints to tread 
the wine-press. It is at this period we believe, that the earth 
and the heavens are to be purified by that fire, which is to 
destroy utterly the body of the Roman empire, the fourth 
kingdom of Daniel, which we also conceive may probably become 
the Lake of Fire. It is also at this period, that we place the judg- 
ment of the quick in Matth. xxv. 32. f In this judgment it is 
perfectly plain from 1. Cor. vi. 2, and other Scriptures, that the 

* Mede's Works, Book iv. Epist. xv. 

< f This judgment being after the Lord sits down on the throne of 
his glory, must, 1 now believe, be subsequent in order and time to the 



xxii 



PREFACE. 



saints are as joint assessors to be with the Lord on his throne ; 
and if our modern Doctors and Religious Magazines know not 
these things, it only proves, that, however deeply read in the 
theology of human systems, they yet have never advanced beyond 
the first principles of the doctrine of Christ.* 

The wicked being now cut off from the earth, and the earth 
renewed in beauty like the garden of Eden, the Holy City, the 
heavenly Jerusalem, shall descend from God out of heaven, and 
our Lord and his saints shall reign in that city, the place of the 
soles of his feet being the Jerusalem that now is, rebuilt, and its 
temple filled with his glory, f 

During the whole of that dispensation the wicked dead shall 
dwell in Hades, according to what is written in Ps. ix. "The 
wicked shall be turned into Hades, Vinib (Sheol,) and all the na- 
tions which forget God." So also in Ps. xlix. 14, " Like sheep 
they are laid in Hades,J (Sheol) ; death shall feed upon them ; 
and the upright shall have dominion over them in the morning ; 
their beauty is (appointed) to decay. Hades, (Sheol,) is the 
dwelling for ihem.\ But God will redeem my soul from the power 
of Hades, (Sheol,) for he shall receive me." Now, as I have 
remarked in another place, || these passages are utterly incapable 
of any consistent interpretation on the common scheme of a pro- 
miscuous resurrection of the just and unjust at that period, when 
we know that Death and Hades shall be cast into the lake of fire, 
i. e. utterly abolished, Rev. xx. 14. But on the Scriptural prin- 
ciple of a double resurrection, first of the just and then of the 
unjust, the language of the Psalmist is plain and intelligible, 
signifying simply that during the Millennial dispensation, when 

day of Armageddon. It is the judgment of all nations remaining 
after that awful destruction. If, therefore, Mr. Begg means that it is 
parallel with Dan. vii. 9, 10, as the anonymous writer represents him 
to do, I must think that he in this point is mistaken. 

* Heb. vi. 1. f Ezek - xliii - 7. 

\ Our English translation, in the graves, is, as every child in Hebrew 
knows, utterly wrong. 

§ See Horsley in loco, also Castellio " Eisque domicilium futurus est 
orcus." 

|| My Tract, The Doctrine of the Millennial Advent and Reign of 
Messiah vindicated from the objections of the Edinburgh Theological 
Magazine, p. 17. This Tract is out of print, but will, D. V,, be 
reprinted. 



PREFACE. 



xxiii 



the just shall by the first resurrection have been redeemed from 
the power of Hades, the unjust shall remain under it, their resur- 
rection not taking place till a later period. 

The Millennial dispensation being ended, is followed by the re- 
bellion of Gog, after the discomfiture of which, the last act of the 
Great Judgment takes place by the resurrection of the unjust, 
and, as we also suppose, of the righteous who have died during the 
Millennium. After this we conceive it probable that the earth 
will undergo a farther baptism by fire,* when it will be clothed 
with its final and celestial glory, and our Lord having subdued all 
enemies, shall deliver up the kingdom to God, even the Father. 

Now, as the first advent of Christ includes in it all that he 
did and suffered when upon earth, and the whole period of time 
between his nativity in Bethlehem and his ascension to heaven, so 
we conceive that his second advent is to comprehend in it aJl 
those acts of the Great Judgment, and all that period which shall 
intervene between his descent from heaven with the Archangel 
and the Trump of God, and the final delivering up of the kingdom. 
The second advent is therefore not one event, but includes a long 
and complicated series of events, extending through ages of ages, 
all germinating towards higher, and yet higher accomplishments 
and developments, of the mighty plans of redemption. 

I now return to the objections of the anonymous writer. 

He affirms that on our scheme a large portion of the ungodly 
who shall be alive at Christ's coming will he little affected by that 
event, because they may not be among those who shall be de- 
stroyed but may be ultimately saved. f 

Had he for the term ungodly in this passage used the word un- 
converted, it would have been a fairer representation of our senti- 
ments. By the ungodly we are usually in the habit of understand- 
ing the wicked. Now, to represent us as expecting any of the 
wicked to be saved in that day, is utterly false. Their place shall 
be the furnace of fire. 

But is this writer displeased if God shall find out some other 
way wherein the unconverted may " be affected," (to use the 

* That there is to be a judgment by fire before the Millennium, is 
plain from Rev. xix. 20, and that there is to be a second destruction 
by fire after the Millennium, is proved by Ch. xx. 9. 

f See his Tract, pp. 9, 10. 



Xxiv PREFACE. 

words of the writer himself,) than by their destruction ? and if in 
the midst of judgment He remembers mercy, and if while he cuts 
off all the wicked of the earth and sweeps them into the lake of 
fire, He is pleased also to glorify his free grace by sparing multi- 
tudes, who, having not known their master's will, shall have done 
things worthy of stripes,* but after being chastened in the awful 
tribulation of the last times, shall cry for mercy, and be spared 
and introduced, not into the glory of the saints, but into the Sab- 
batism of the world under Messiah's gentle sceptre ? Is the eye 
of this writer evil because God is good ? Does he sit like Jonah 
under his gourd, watching for the damnation of the whole multi- 
tude of the, at that time, unconverted nations ? Had the Son of 
Man power when upon earth in deep humiliation to forgive sin, 
and will this writer, because a human Confession of Faith requires 
it, presume to despoil him of this power when He comes again as 
the Lord of Glory, limiting thus the prerogatives of his high be- 
hests below those even of the creature, since it is given even to 
the king of England to exercise mercy in despite of the sentence 
of law? 

According to what the author calls the orthodox scheme, these 
vast multitudes are, if the Lord does not come, to be converted by 
Missionary and Bible Societies to give new splendour to their 
anniversaries. But if the Lord, in answer to the cries of his 
Bride, does come, then it seems not one soul of them is to find 
mercy: Yea, the hands of the Lord himself are to be tied up 
from the exercise even of a single act of grace. But does this 
writer really dare thus to limit the Creator and Judge of all, and 
say that He cannot and shall not take that work into his own 
hand which the common system assigns to the miserable Commit- 
tees of our Societies ? f 

* Luke xii. 48. 

f This expression has been censured as if it were intended to reflect 
dishonour on these Societies. I, on the contrary, highly honour 
them as instruments of God for good to the world, but assuredly when 
hopes are expressed of the conversion of the world by the Missions 
of the present Churches, I must for such a work believe them alto- 
gether inadequate, and the language of the Lord himself to the Lao- 
dicean Church, becomes I think then applicable to these Churches, 
and their Missionary Societies, " thou sayest, I am rich, and increased 
with goods, and have need of nothing ; and knowest not that thou art 
wretched, and blind, and miserable, and poor, and naked." Rev. iii. 17. 



PREFACE. 



XXV 



Next, the writer affirms with respect to the great body of the 
wicked dead, that on the Literal scheme they will be little affected 
by the coming of Christ, because 11 they are not to he raised at this 
time; and it is noteasjr to see, if the views of our opponents be correct, 
that the coming of the Lord will in the least degree affect them."* 
Having thus said that the fact of an interval of a thousand years 
intervening between our Lord's descent from heaven and the re- 
surrection of the wicked would render his coming of none effect 
to them, the writer in his very next paragraph uproots the prin- 
ciple of this objection by asserting that, on the orthodox view, the 
importance of the coming of Christ and the necessity of making 
preparation for it are not in the least diminished by the considera- 
tion that it may (will) not happen for upwards of a thousand 
years. " We have (adds the writer) the same deep and abiding in- 
terest in it whensoever it may take place. '"f But if so, is it not 
equally manifest that the wicked in Hades have the same deep 
and abiding, though awful concern, in the coming of Christ, even 
though they shall not rise for a thousand years after his appear- 
ance, since one of the certain results of his coming shall be their 
resurrection to damnation ? Moreover, what are we to think of 
the consistency, and competency, and love of justice of this 
anonymous writer, who thus in one paragraph endeavours to 
establish a principle against his opponents, and in his very next 
paragraph abrogates the very same principle when it bears against 
himself ? 

It cannot however fail to excite the admiration of the reader 
when he is made acquainted with the circumstance, that although 
this anonymous author states it as an insuperable objection to the 
Literal scheme that it does not place the resurrection of the 
wicked at a period sufficiently early, yet it does in reality place 
that resurrection at the very same moment of time, as it is supposed 
to take place on the Spiritual, or, as the writer will have it, the 
Orthodox scheme of this generation of the Church. For let it be 
supposed that the Millennium is to commence in any given year, 
the year 1870 for example, then, according to the Literal scheme, 
the rest of the dead are to arise at the end of the Millennium 
computed from that year ; so on the Spiritual scheme at the end 



* Tract, p. 10. 



c 



f P. 11. 



xxvi 



PREFACE. 



of the Millennium, computed from the same year, Christ descends 
from heaven, and raises both the righteous and wicked. On both 
schemes, then, the wicked are raised at the same point of time. 
The main difference between the two is, that the Spiritual or 
Antimillenarian system, robs the Church of the First-Born of 
their glorious precedence in the order of the resurrection, and con- 
signs them, as well as the wicked, to Hades, during the whole Mil- 
lenary period.* 

I must now, however, proceed a step farther, and by showing 
that the Premillennial Advent of Christ will most deeply affect the 
wicked dead during the whole of that dispensation : Since it can- 
not fail to add unspeakably to their anguish, and their awful prog- 
nostications of coming judgment, to see the gates of Hades opened 
wide for the resurrection of the righteous, while they are left under 
the power of that enemy — and however little it may harmonize 
with the theology of the Westminster Confession, and however 
difficult it may be to explain it, yet we must on the authority of the 
inspired Psalmist in the passages already quoted, f acknowledge 
that the Scriptures teach the continuance of the wicked in Hades, 
to be a part of their punishment. 

Having thus considered some of the general arguments of the 
anonymous author, I now turn to his reasoning from the Scrip- 
tures. But were I to follow him through all the passages of Scrip- 
ture which he endeavours to prove to be opposed to the Literal 
doctrine, these remarks would swell into a treatise ; I must there- 
fore limit myself to the consideration of some of them. 

Let us first inquire how far the words of 2 Pet. iii. 3 — 14, when 
compared with other Scriptures, justify the conclusion of the 
author of the Tract, that a literal and entire destruction of the 
present heavens and earth % is thereby intended. 

It is admitted by him, " that both Millenarians and Anti-mil- 

* In my Review of Dr. Wardlaw's Sermon on the Millennium, 
sect, i., I have sufficiently refuted the modern theological fahle, that 
the spirits of the righteous while under the power of Death are in 
glory. In addition to the scriptural evidence which I have there 
brought forward, let me now refer to Rev. xx. 13 — 15, wherein it is 
manifest that of the dead that were found in the sea without sepulture, 
and in Death, that is, the Grave, and in Hades, some at least were 
found written in the book of life, i. e. were righteous. 

f Ps. ix. 17. xlix. 14. % See Anonymous Tract, p. 23. 



PREFACE. 



xxvii 



lenarians agree in referring the sublime scenes described in the 
text of St. Peter to the time of Christ's second advent.''* Now, 
the advent is no where said to be for the destruction, but always 
for the renovation of this lower creation. " Let the heavens rejoice 
and the earth be glad ; let the sea roar and the fulness thereof ; 
let the field be joyful, and all that is therein: then shall all the 
trees of the wood rejoice before the Lord ; for he cometh, for he 
cometh to judge the earth : he shall judge the world with righteous- 
ness, and the people with his truth. "\ In like manner the words of 
St. Peter, Acts iii. 21, inform us, that Christ comes at the times 
of the restitution of all things; and the signification of avraxarcurraffi;, 
apokatastasis, is properly restoration to pristine condition. It 
cannot by any possible ingenuity be so perverted as to mean 
destruction. 

So also all this lower creation is said to be waiting for the mani- 
festation of the Sons of God,% whiclr, as we know from Coloss. 
iii. 4, shall be when Christ shall appear ; and the reason why the 
creature thus waits, is because it shall then be delivered from the 
bondage of corruption, into the glorious liberty of the children of 
God. In exact harmony with these passages are the words of the 
Psalmist, quoted in the Epistle to the Hebrews, whereby we are 
informed, that the end of the folding up the present heavens and 
earth is not destruction, but change. \\ 

Nor do the words of St. Peter, when strictly analysed, lead to a 
different conclusion. He does not even use one expression which 
signifies the destruction of the heavens and earth ; in ver. 7, he 
says, that the present heaven and earth are reserved unto fire unto 
the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men. Here is 
not a syllable of the destruction of the heavens and earth, but 
only of the wicked of the human race. In ver. 9, he says the 
heavens shall pass away, which is evidently another expression for 
the folding up of the heavens mentioned by the Psalmist and in 
the Epistle to the Hebrews, Then he tells us that the elements 
being burned shall be dissolved. Xow, the word Xu&>, from which 
is in its strictest sense means to loose or untie, and there- 

fore the sense is, that the present combinations of the elemental 

* See Anonymous Tract, p. 20. 
t Ps. xcvi. 11 — 13. See also xcviii. 4 — 9. 
I Rom. viii. 19. || Heb. i. 12. 

c 2 



xxviii 



PREFACE. 



principles, which are the effect of the curse on the earth by reason 
of the sin of man, shall by the fire of that day be loosed. So also 
the earth, whereby is to be understood the surface of the globe and 
the works that are therein, shall be burned. This expression, 
which is without doubt the strongest in the whole passage,* yet 
does not imply the destruction of the material substance of the 
globe, but only a change in it by fire. In the 12th verse, we find 
it again said that the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved or 
loosed, and the elements shall melt being burned. Still this lan- 
language implies only the loosing of the present combinations of 
the material frame of the world, and we learn from the context, 
that it is preparatory to new heavens and a new earth. That is, 
the former frame being loosed, the elemental principles shall, 
under the plastic hand of the Creator, assume those new combina- 
tions of ethereal beauty, and light, and fragrance, under which the 
earth freed from the curse, shall yield her fruit and bring forth her 
increase. f Indeed, the very word used, which is melt, might 
have taught this anonymous writer that refinement and not de- 
struction is the end of the conflagration, seeing that it is impossible 
for him to point out any process of melting excepting for the pur- 
poses of refinement, and giving new forms to the substance which 
undergoes that process. 

Next, as to the order and the time in which this stupendous 
event shall be accomplished, we deny not that there are difficul- 
ties, but they are just similar to the difficulties which embarrassed 
the minds of the prophets, when they searched " what, or what 
manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify* 
when it testified before hand the sufferings of Christ, and the glory 
that should follow."]; 

As it is demonstrated in the following Tract, that the coming of 
Christ is at the destruction of the Fourth Monarchy, or the Ro- 
man empire in its last state, so it must hence be inferred that the 

* I must here, however, observe, that the Syriac and also some 
other ancient copies of the Greek have here a different reading ; in- 
stead of the words, " the earth, &c, shall be burned, they read, the 
earth, &c. shall not he found." 

f Ps. lxvii. 6, and let the reader attentively observe, that this state 
of the earth is to be the consequence of Christ's judging the people 
righteously. The Psalm belongs then to the time when he shall judge 
the quick and dead at his appearing and kingdom. 

X 1 Pet. i. 1 1. 



PREFACE. 



xxix 



conflagration then begins. Accordingly, we are informed, both 
in Dan. vii. 11, and Rev. xix. 20, that the destruction of the 
Fourth Beast is by fire. This then we believe to be the fire of 
St. Peter, whereby the heavens, that is, the atmosphere of the 
earth, shall be dissolved and pass away. With respect to the 
burning of the earth, the greater part of us of the Literal School 
believe, that during the Millennium the fire is to extend no fur- 
ther than the territories of the Fourth Beast, for his destruction 
and that of his lawless horn. But as we know that every year on 
the return of Spring, the change in the atmosphere which then 
takes place, is sufficient to renew the face of the earth, we find 
no difficulty in conceiving, that when the present heaven shall 
have passed away by the action of fire, and the atmosphere shall 
have literally put on the appearance, as well as the reality, of a 
new Heaven shining with resplendent brightness, and shedding 
down no pestilential influences, but breathing ambrosial per- 
fumes, and the softest zephyrs of Eden, — this mighty atmos- 
pheric change alone, will be enough to realize all that the 
Scriptures tell us of the New Earth, wherein dwelleth righte- 
ousness. 

If, on the other hand, the conflagration before the Millennium 
is to be universal, extending to the whole surface of the globe, it 
remains that we should consider the objection of the anonymous 
writer, that it is impossible that any individual should be able to 
survive * such a catastrophe ; and, again, whither shall the nations 
flee for safety while the heavens and the earth are enveloped in 
flaming flre.f Now, all such arguments, when sifted thoroughly, 
will be seen to resolve themselves into direct atheism. They are 
founded not indeed upon the avowed principle that God cannot 
do this thing, but. upon the secret unbelief of his power, or his 
willingness, to save his creatures from such a conflagration. 
It seems to have been in the foresight of such atheistical reason- 
ing that the Spirit of God speaking in the 102d Psalm, after 
pronouncing the end that awaits the heaven and the earth that 
now are, next adds the words which follow, to show, that in the 
midst of these mighty changes, the unchangeableness of Jehovah 



* Tract, P. 22. f Ibid. P. 25. 

c 3 



XXX 



PREFACE. 



is to be a sufficient security to his children for their preservation : 
" But thou art the same, and thy years shall have no end. The 
children of thy servants shall continue, and their seed shall 
he established before thee." If Moses at the Red Sea had rea- 
soned like this anonymous writer, Israel must have perished 
in the mighty waters — for it was by faith, and not by unbelief, 
that they passed through the Red Sea.* 

In reply to the reasoning of the anonymous writer with respect 
to the judgment in Matth. xxv. 31 — 46, which occupies no less 
than twelve pages of his Tract, f I shall simply observe, that 
until an answer shall have been found to the arguments contained 
in two of my former works,! whereby I have demonstrated that the 
Judgment belongs to the period of the Millennium, it will be su- 
perfluous for me to enter into the objections of this anonymous 
writer. In the meanwhile I shall just observe, that it is quite 
impossible that the all nations gathered before the Lord can mean 
the whole human race, since we learn from Ps. xlix. 14, 15, that 
the wicked shall remain in Hades at the time the just are raised. 
This is also confirmed by 1 Thess. iv. 16, which tells us, that the 
dead in Christ arise first, and with respect to the quick or living 
saints, when our Lord comes, we are informed they ascend with 
the raised saints to meet the Lord in the air, and so sudden is 
that event that two women shall be grinding at the mill, the one 
shall be taken to meet the Lord and the other left.§ There is not 
a word in these passages of all nations being first assembled 
before him and then separated into two bands. The whole de- 

* Heb. xi. 29. t P. 26—38. 

J See my " Critical Examination of some of the fundamental Prin- 
ciples of the Ptev. G. S. Faber's Sacred Calendar of Prophecy; with 
an Answer to his Arguments against the Millennial Advent and 
Reign of Messiah," p. 107 — 110. Also, my " Doctrine of the Mil- 
lennial Advent and Reign of Messiah vindicated from the Objections 
of the Edinburgh Theological Magazine," p. 25 — 30. As this 
anonymous writer wishes to bear us down with the weight of his 
seven Reviewers, I may be permitted in self-defence to quote the words 
of the late Rev. Robert Hall, of Bristol, (after having read the former 
of these tracts,) to a Christian friend of mine, by whom they were 
communicated to me in a letter dated 15th August, 1829. " Mr. C. 
— (says Mr. Hall) — has entirely demolished all Mr. Faber's positions." 
The remainder of the testimony I shall withhold. 

§ Matth. xxiv. 41. 



PREFACE. 



xxxi 



scription will, in point of fact, quite as little suit the scheme 
of the Spiritualists as they conceive it to be reconcileable to 
ours.* 

The anonymous writer then passes on to the review of Dan. 
vii. 9 — 14, relating to the Judgment of the Ancient of Days and 
coming of the Son of Man,f and there are three things which 
he here chiefly animadverts upon. First, The assertion of 
Mr. Begg that the thrones were placed on the earth. Now, on 
this point I think Mr. Begg errs. It appears to me quite evident 
that the thrones must be placed where Christ first arrives on his 
descent from heaven, that is, (see 1 Thess. iv. 17) in the air.% 
Secondly, The anonymous writer charges us with inconsistency 
because we interpret the Session of the Ancient of Days figura- 
tively, and the coming of the Son of Man literally. Our answer 
to this objection is, that the language of the 110th Psalm, "Sit 
thou at my right hand until I make thine enemies thy footstool" 
makes it manifest, that there is to be a putting forth of the power 
of the Eternal Father, in subjecting the enemies of Christ to his 
righteous dominion. This is also confirmed by Rev. xi. 15, for 
when the seventh trumpet sounded, " there were great voices in 
heaven, saying, The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms 
of our Lord and of his Christ." It appears from the distinc- 
tion of persons that the expression " our Lord" here refers to the 
Eternal Father. Moreover, when the elders afterwards fall 
prostrate and say, " We give thee thanks, 0 Lord God Almighty, 
which art, and wast, and art to come, because thou hast taken to 
thee thy great power and hast reigned," it is evidently the Almighty 
Father who is addressed. This conclusion, at which I had previ- 
ously arrived in my own mind, I find is also that of the learned 
Vitringa. § 

* There is a Chapter on the order of events connected with the 
Advent in the 3d edition of my work on the Apocalypse, to which I 
must refer the reader. It is chap. xix. 

f See Tract of the writer, p. 38—47. 

X It is very possible that I myself may be chargeable with having 
erred in the same respect in the former edition of this Tract. But so 
far as I recollect, at this distance of time, when I spoke of the Ancient 
of Days coming to the earth, I intended the earth to be understood 
astronomically, as including its atmosphere. 

§ " Vertunt Presbyteri orationem suam ad Deum Patrem Regem 
Throno insidentem." " The Elders direct their prayer to God the 



xxxii 



PREFACE. 



Let the reader also bear it in mind that the kingdom referred 
to is that of this world, over which the Beast had heretofore 
reigned. But the sentence of deposition is now passed upon him, 
and the Eternal Father does for a short time take to himself the 
kingdom for the purpose of introducing his king, the Lord 
Messiah, and installing him in his high office. Let it be observed 
in the next place, that this intermediate kingdom of the Father is 
no symbol, it is to the wicked an awful, and to the righteous a 
joyful reality. But the Father himself being essentially invisible, 
his kingdom is also essentially invisible, as well as the agency of 
the judgment which He executes. If, however, these things are 
to be revealed to the church in prophetic vision, it becomes neces- 
sary that it should be done by external imagery manifest to the 
senses, since the things themselves cannot be seen by mortal eyes ; 
and we are struck with wonder at the exact adaptation of the 
imagery of Daniel to that which is intended. The temporary 
reign of the Eternal Father over the earth is signified by the 
removal, as it were, of his throne to the atmosphere of this globe. 
The Beast and his lawless Horn are by figure summoned to the 
bar, and the sentence of death is passed on them, and its execu- 
tion begins. 

At length the Son of Man is presented before the throne, 
amidst the mighty thunderings of the symphonies of acclaiming, 
thousands and ten thousands, that He only is worthy to receive 
this power : and he is solemnly invested with the kingdom. 
Now, seeing that this Son of Man is our brother, one with us, and 
we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones, and He 
is the Bridegroom come to take to himself the Bride, the 
Immanuel, God with us, and seeing that all Scripture assures us 
that his second coming shall be with clouds, and every eye shall 
behold him, it is therefore just at the moment when he appears on 
the scene of action, that we believe the transition takes place from 
the shadow to the substance, from the figurative to the literal, from 
the spiritual to the corporeal, from the invisible to the visible ; 
and when our opponents continue to symbolize after the coming of 
the Son of Man, and to tell us, in contempt of all Scripture and 

Father sitting on the throne." Scott also seems to acknowledge that 
the Father is 'primarily addressed. 



PREFACE. 



xxxiii 



the unanimous voice of the ancient church, and in the very teeth 
of the express Scriptural declaration that He shall destroy the 
max of six with the brightness of Jus coming * that Christ " does 
not require to come personally"^ for that end, we must say in 
answer, let God be true and every man a liar ; and though all the 
religious newspapers and magazines of England and Scotland, yea, 
and all the clergy of every class and denomination, including 
every celebrated name and every famous doctor of divinity, and 
every theological professor, shall join as one man in this un- 
equalled perversion of the Divine testimony, J and in crying us 
down as heretics, we shall say, let God be true and every man a 
liar. 

The third point upon which the anonymous writer animadverts, 
is the assertion of Mr. Begg, confirmed by the testimony of Mr. 
Faber and myself, that it is while the Ancient of Days was sitting 
in judgment (Dan. vii. 9, 10) that one like the Son of Alan 
came with clouds and was brought near before him. The anony- 
mous author, however, with one dash of his pen, sweeps away our 
conclusion, saying, that neither of us condescend to point out its 
evidence ; and he afterwards tell us, that so far as the testimony 
of Daniel goes, the judgment was finished before the Son of Man 
appeared. § 

Mr. Faber has been known as a writer on prophecy for twenty- 
eight years, and I have been writing on it for twenty-six years, nor 
did I dare to take up my pen on so high a subject till after a pre- 
vious study of four or five years. Xow, here is a point on which 

* 2 Thess. ii. 8. f See the Tract of the anonymous writer, p. 45. 

X I am aware of only one other perversion of the Divine testimony 
which is equal to this, viz. the reasoning by which the Romish church 
endeavours to reconcile Image worship with the second commandment. 

§ Tract, pp. 43, 44. Although I have argued this point below T on 
grounds distinct from the direct testimony of Daniel himself, yet even 
from this testimony it is plain that the Son of Man comes during the 
sitting of the Judgment. For is it not while the Ancient of Days 
is sitting on the throne which is placed for the judgment, that the Son 
of Man is brought near unto him ? Also in yer. 21, 22, it is said that 
the Little Horn prevailed against the Saints, not only until the 
Ancient of Days came, but until judgment, potestas judicandi, judicial 
power, is given to the saints of the Most High. It hence follows, 
that before the complete destruction of the Horn, the Son of Man 
and his saints are invested with the power in entire harmony with 
Rev. xix. 



xxxiv 



PREFACE. 



Mr. Faber and myself, who have so often been engaged in con- 
troversy, are perfectly agreed, viewing it as quite indisputable.* 
Yet this mere novice (for such he assuredly is), has the modesty to 
come before the public and say he knows more of it than both of 
us. Without apparently having looked into Mr. Faber 's Sacred 
Calendar, where the point is discussed at some length, he quarrels 
with him for not producing the evidence. In my Dissertation on 
the Apocalypse, which is the result of thirty years' labour, t I have 
by Scriptural induction established an order of events, which 
necessarily includes the point under discussion. But without 
having apparently seen my work, this writer quarrels with me 
because in a small Tract of forty pages I have not produced the 
evidence. Since, however, he does ask for evidence, it shall be 
given him. Let him know then, that his own very next para- 
graph \ contains the evidence which he requires ; and had he eyes 
to see he would have seen it. He there admits, that it follows 
from what is said in Rev. xix. 11 — 21, that the Beast is destroyed 
by the special agency of the Son of Man. Now, if so, the Son of 
Man, being the agent in executing the judgment and treading the 
wine-press, must be come before the work is done, i. e. before the 
judgment of the Ancient of Days, which ends in the destruction of 
the Beast, is finished. This, verily, is a mere truism. It simply 
affirms that a person who actually treads a wine-press must be 
present at the scene of operations. I pretend not to any gift of 
sagacity in discovering this, and I am sorry to take up my own 
time and that of my readers with such an argument. But when 
persons like this anonymous writer choose to shut then eyes to the 
consequences of truths or facts which they themselves admit, there 
is no other way of combating them but with self-evident proposi- 
tions. We shall give a second proof. The seven vials of the 
wrath of God are the Apocalyptic representation of the same 
events as are signified in Dan. vii. by the judgment of the Ancient 
of Days. This judgment ends in the giving the body of the 
Beast to the burning flame, and in like manner the vials end with 
the treading of the wine-press and the casting the Beast and 

* Mede also says, " While this judgment sits, and when it had 
destroyed the Fourth Beast, the Son of Man, which comes with cloudSj 
receives dominions," &c. 

f I mean the third edition. J Tract, p. 44. 



PREFACE . 



XXXV 



False Prophet alive into the lake of fire. Now, from Rev. xiv. 
14 — 20, it is manifest Christ comes with clouds, and reaps the 
harvest of the earth before the wine-press is trodden. From Rev. 
xvi. 15, it is equally manifest that he comes during the vials, and 
consequently, for both reasons, he certainly comes during the 
sitting of the judgment of the Ancient of Days. 

I hope the foregoing arguments may convince the anonymous 
author that the above position, which he has rashly asserted to be 
gratuitous, is supported by the most irrefragable evidence. But if 
they do not convince him, as I pretend not to the gift of restoring 
the sight, I must leave it to a higher power than that of any 
human or even Scriptural argument, to work that salutary effect. 

As it is now time for me to draw these strictures to a close, I 
shall content myself with very briefly noticing one or two other 
points. 

In page 44, the anonymous author affirms that Christ is even 
now ruling the nations with a rod of iron. I must, however, 
assure him that this is so palpable an error, as to make it plain he 
is utterly ignorant of the subject he has rashly touched. The 
Lord must be set as King on his holy hill of Zion, i. e. He must 
receive the kingdom of his Father David, before he takes to him 
his iron rod.* When he is first revealed coming with clouds, he 
wears not yet the A,«^«, Diadem, but only the 2rs<p«v<j?, Crown. 
Nor is he first manifested as the minister of wrath, but of mercy. 
Sitting on a white cloud he reaps the harvest of the earth, which 
is the gathering of the remnant of his elect; the 144,000 sealed 
ones having been previously caught up. Now, let me here ask 
the anonymous author to explain to us the exact signification 
of some of these symbols, as, for example, the Stephanos, or 
Crown, and the Diadem. Am I doing him injustice when I ex- 
press my firm conviction that it has never even entered into his 
imagination that they have any special meaning, and, therefore, 
that he knows nothing at all of their signification, and of the con- 
nection of these various symbols with the order of Apocalyptic 
events, and the progressive manifestations of the Kingdom of 
God ? But if so, he is yet utterly unqualified to handle these 
high subjects, and ought to go to school before he again writes on 



* Compare Psalm ii. 6 — 9, with Rev. xix. 15. 



xxxvi 



PREFACE. 



prophecy. I must refer him to my Work on the Apocalypse for 
the signification of these symbols, and he will learn from what 
I have written, our reasons for believing that the Lord's ruling 
the nations with a rod of iron belongs to a period subsequent even 
to his first appearance with clouds to reap the earth. 

In page 54, he asserts that all the members of the Church 
cannot be present at the marriage, if it take place before the 
Millennium. I reply, in the first place, that it is undeniable, 
from Rev. xix. 7, that the marriage does precede the Millennium. 
Secondly, the above argument affords another proof of this 
anonymous author being yet in his prophetic novitiate. It is 
plain he has not yet learned the distinction between the Church 
of the First Born, that is, the Bride, and the Virgins which are 
the companions of the Bride * I must therefore tell him what 
we believe on these points. When the wise virgins go in with 
our Lord to the marriage, it is our belief that the Church of the 
First Born or First Fruits, is completed, and that door for ever 
shut ; nor shall one of the race of Adam thereafter enter it. The 
saved afterwards do not, and cannot, inherit that glory. They 
shall indeed walk in the light of the New Jerusalem,! but they 
are not citizens of it. They shall inherit a felicity which eye 
hath not seen nor ear heard ; but to be joint heirs with Christ — 
to sit with him on his Throne — to be the sharers of his dominion 
over all worlds, and the heralds of his high behests of light, of 
purity, of love, and of blessedness, to all orders of intelligent 
creation, and the most distant regions of immeasurable space, we 
believe to be limited to those who, having suffered with Christ, 
shall also reign with him, even the Church of the First Born, 
whose names are written in heaven. 

We know that these high mysteries must appear strange to 
those who drink only from the broken cisterns of human confes- 
sions of faith. But the body of the Church, in these days, being 
contented with elemental truth, cannot but remain, as to know- 
ledge, in a state of infancy. They ought not, however, to wonder 
if they who have drank from the fountain of living waters, have 
learned something more than themselves of the treasures of wis- 
dom and knowledge which are hid in Christ Jesus. 



* Psalm xlv. 9, 14. 



f Rev. xxi. 24. 



PREFACE. 



XXXV11 



Still let me add, (to prevent the imputation of boasting,) that 
we count not ourselves to have apprehended. We deeply feel our 
remaining ignorance. It is extremely probable, that, with regard 
to the order of events at our Lord's advent, we are mistaken in 
some things, and there are other things which we confess our in- 
ability to explain. But we are assuredly not mistaken in placing 
the Advent itself before the Millennium, this point being unan- 
swerably demonstrated from the Scriptures, in the Tract, of which 
a second edition is now sent forth, the reasoning of which has 
never been answered and cannot be answered, by the opponents 
of our doctrine. We are assuredly also not mistaken in placing 
the conflagration which destroys the Roman Empire before the 
Millennium,* and there will be enough of fire there for the per- 
dition of every ungodly man on earth. Once more, we are as- 
suredly not mistaken in placing the Marriage of the Lamb pre- 
vious to the Millennium, since, in Rev. xix. 7, we are informed 
that it happens before He goes forth to tread the Wine Press. 
Now, as a marriage in the absence of the Bridegroom is an utter 
solecism in the economy of human life, so do the songs of praise 
which, in the above passage, ascend up in celebration of the ar- 
rival of the celestial nuptials, make it evident, even to demon- 
stration, that the days of the fasting and mourning of the children 
of the bride chamber, on account of the absence of the Bride- 
groom, are passed away for ever. 

* Dan. vii. 11. Rev. xix. 20. 

September 17 th, 1833, 



PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 



Since the appearance of the First Edition of this Tract, a period 
of eight years has passed over our heads, filled with events, which 
in ordinary times, would have been thought of sufficient magnitude 
to have illustrated a centurj'. Among these events we may 
enumerate the dismemberment of the Ottoman empire, the re- 
storation of the Greek kingdom, the expulsion of the Turks from 
Palestine, and its occupation by the power of Egypt; the over- 
throw of the Religious and Political Constitution of England, by 
the Catholic Emancipation Act in 1829, and the Reform Bill in 
1832 ; the new shock of the French Revolution in 1830, dethron- 
ing the elder branch of the Bourbons ; the Revolution and Civil 
War in Portugal and Spain — and at the moment when this is 
written, public affairs: in this country seem to tremble on the verge 
of some new crisis. 

Believing that the whole of these portentous changes are rapidly 
preparing the way of the Lord, being the continued fulfilment of 
the shaking of all earthly power which is to precede his advent, I 
send forth a third Edition of this Tract, in the full persuasion that 
we are arrived at the last hour of this dispensation, and shall only 
add that I pray it may please God to bless these pages to the 
awakening of some who are yet asleep, and that the writer and 
every reader may be prepared for the sudden descent of the Son 
of God with the voice of the Archangel and the Trump of God, 
the great event which he believes to be at the door. 

London, June 25th, 1836. 



ERRATUM. 

In page 41, line 3, for Daniel xii. 9 — 14, read Daniel vii. 9 — 14, 



THE SECOND ADVENT 

OF 

MESSIAH, 

Sec. $c. 



In replying to the queries of D. D. in your Number for July, 
it will become necessary to embrace a wide field of Scriptural 
research. 

I feel no hesitation in acknowledging that wherever a future 
advent or presence, <xcio tutrix, Parousia, of our Lord is foretold in 
Scripture, we who believe in his personal advent and reign, do 
understand one and the same advent to be uniformly intended ; 
and that we ground this conclusion upon the careful comparison 
of Scripture with Scripture, according to the rule so clearly 
established and illustrated by Bishop Horsley, in his sermons 
upon the words of Peter, " No prophecy of the Scripture is of any 
private interpretation." * 

Before entering into the consideration of the Scriptural evidence 
in support of the above conclusion, I shall place before the reader 
the following luminous passage from the works of Joseph Mede. 
wherein he lays down the great leading principle which is to 
conduct us through all our inquiries into the chronology of 
prophecy — wishing it to be clearly understood, at the same time, 
that I do not bring forward this passage as the foundation of my 
reasoning, but simply as illustrative of its principles. " For the 
" true account of Times in Scripture, we must have recourse 



* 2 Pet. i. 20, 21. 

d2 



40 



" tO that SACRED KALENDAR aild GREAT ALMANACK OF PROPHECY, 

" the four kingdoms of Daniel, which are a prophetical chronology 
" of times measured by the succession of four principal kingdoms, 
" from the beginning of the captivity of Israel, until the mystery 
" of God should be finished. A course of time during which the 
" church and nation of the Jews, together with those, whom, by 
" reason of their unbelief in Christ, God should surrogate in their 
" rooms, was to remain under the bondage of the Gentiles and 
" oppression of Gentilism ; but these kingdoms once finished, all 
" the kingdoms of this world should become the kingdoms of our 
" Lord and his Christ — and to this Great Kalendar of Times, to- 
" gether with that other but lesser Kalendar of Seventy weeks 
" (Dan. ix.), all mention of times in Scripture seems to have 
" reference." * 

The first text in the chronological prophecies wherein we find 
the second advent clearly predicted, is Dan. vii. 13, 14. After 
beholding in the preceding context, the judgment executed by the 
Ancient of Days on the body of the fourth Beast, or the Roman 
empire in its last state, the prophet adds, " I saw in the night 
visions, and, behold, one like the Son of Man came with the clouds 
of heaven, and came to the Ancient of Days, and they brought him 
near before him. And there was given him dominion, and glory, 
and a kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages, should serve 
him : his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass 
away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed. 

If it be asked, to what period in the general chronology of pro- 
phecy this vision belongs, the answer must be, that it clearly and 
indisputably is to be referred to that season, when the seventh 
Apocalyptic trumpet having sounded, great voices are heard in 
heaven, that " the kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms 
of our Lord, and of his Christ, and he shall reign for ever and 
ever.' ' f In other words, the advent of Messiah described by 
Daniel, takes place at the destruction of the fourth, or Roman 
monarchy, and immediately before the Millennium. — And that 
this is the case, is now so universally admitted by the interpreters 
of prophecy, that to enter upon the proof of it were altogether 



* Mede's Apostasy of the Latter Times, Chap. xii. 
f Rev. xi. 15. 



superfluous. Let the reader who is uninformed on the general 
subject, only consider with care and attention the parallel passages 
of Dan. ii. 34, 35, 44, 45, and Dan. xii. 9—14, 18, 22, 26, 27, 
and then compare both with Rev. xi. 15, xix. and xx., and he 
cannot for a moment remain in doubt that they all refer to the 
same period and the same events.* 

* It might have been thought impossible that any commentator 
should have so entirely mistaken the meaning and time, of Daniel's 
vision of the Son of Man, coming with the clouds of heaven, (so often 
referred to in the New Testament) as to apply it to the Ascension of 
our Lord to heaven ; and yet it appears that Maclaurin, as quoted by 
Mr. Scott, in his commentary, actually falls into this glaring prophetic 
anachronism. " The prophet," says Mr. M., " does not represent him 
as coming in the clouds from heaven to earth, (as at the general judg- 
ment), but as coming with the clouds of heaven from his former 
residence towards the throne of God." There is no end of the vagaries 
of commentators, and certainly this is one almost of unequalled mag- 
nitude. Happily, however, the admirable precision of the Scriptural 
language affords a sure and easy means of refuting this most palpable 
error of Mr. Maclaurin, which, while it absolutely sets every principle 
of prophetic chronology at defiance, violates no less all the analogies 
of the Scriptural phraseology. 

I observe then, that wherever ascent from earth to heaven is ex- 
pressed in the Hebrew and Chaldaic Scriptures, the verbs used are 
not the Hebrew Nil and Chaldee una, but the Hebrew TO and the 
Chaldee pfo — Thus in Genesis xvii. 22, " God went up from Abraham," 
the Hebrew is crra* Dffix bi sv i, and the Chaldee of the Targum of 
Onkelos is DrraNi vmbtfD *r\p> pbnDtfi, " and the glory of the Lord 
w r ent up from above Abraham." The Targum of Jonatham Ben 
Uzziel uses also the same verb pbnDhn. 

In Genesis xxxv. 13, " God went up from Jacob," the same verbs 
are used in the Hebrew text and the Targums. In Exod. xix. 3, 
"Moses went up to God" the Hebrew is 1TO nttJQI and the Chaldee 
of the three Targums, viz. Onkelos, Jonathan, and the Jerusalem 
is PD TOQV 

Therefore we certainly conclude, that had Dan. vii. 13, referred (as 
Mr. Maclaurin so strangely supposes) to the ascension of Christ, it is 
quite evident that the Chaldee phrase to express the ascent would not 
have been nriM niD but pVo tt):** 113. Moreover the expression in 
verse 22, " Until the Ancient of Days came," (which from the context 
evidently means his coming to judge the lawless horn of the fourth 
beast) in which the Chaldee verb nriN is used, manifestly proves, that 
the place where the thrones of judgment of ver. 9th are set, is not 
heaven but the earth, (that is, as I understand it, in the air or 
atmosphere of the earth) and therefore, that when the Son of Man 
comes with the clouds, he comes to the earth where the Ancient of 
Days already is. 

I should not have thought it necessary to enter so minutely into 
this point, which is long since settled among the students of prophecy, 

d3 



42 



Passing on now to the New Testament, we find our attention 
arrested by a remarkable annunciation in St. Paul's prophecy 
of the man of sin, in 2 Thess. ih 3 — 12, which exactly fixes 
the chronology of our Lord's advent, and pins it down to 
the time of the destruction of that power. Having in the 
context given a lively description of the man of sin, the 
Apostle, in ver. 8, adds these emphatic words, " whom the 
Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth, xat xarugyyuret 
try striQuvsi? rn$ tfu^ovtrius avrov, and shall destroy ( abolish ) with 
the brightness of his coming" Believing with the whole of 
the Protestant Churches, that this Man of Sin is an ecclesias- 
tical tyranny which was to arise in the professing Church of 
Christ, within the limits of the Western empire, we discern 
in the prophetic description an exact delineation of the Pope 
of Rome, and we thus are led to identify St. Paul's Man of 

except for the purpose of showing, bow little dependence can be 
placed upon some of the most eminent writers upon general and 
practical theology, when they handle the subject of prophecy. 

The Syriac being, as the learned reader knows, a sister dialect of 
the Chaldee, it has occurred to me, since writing the foregoing 
observations, to examine the Syriac version of the New Testament at 
Acts i. 11, and it has afforded me no little gratification to find, one 
and all of my own previous remarks and anticipations corroborated 
and justified by the Syriac rendering of the latter clause of the 
verse, which is as follows : " This same Jesus who is taken up from 
you into heaven," wmh p^DT TOWTrn nd «n«3 NOT, shall so come 
in like manner as ye have seen him ascend to heaven." The verb for his 
future coming being »n« evidently the same root as the Chaldee nriN 
used in Dan. vii. 13, for the future coming of the Son of Man, and the 
verb for his ascending in the view of his disciples being p^D. This 
therefore sets the matter quite at rest, and wholly refutes the gloss of 
Mr. Maciaurin. 

As the synchronism, which the above Note is intended to vindicate, 
is fully established by Mr. Faber in his Sacred Calendar, vol. I. p. 218 
— 225, it would have been unnecessary for me to re-insert it in this 
edition of my Tract, had not a Reverend writer, in the Christian 
Review for 1828, been pleased to question the soundness of my criti- 
cism. After a portion of unprovoked scurrility against myself, which 
is not very becoming in one who at his ordination professed to be 
called by the Holy Ghost to the ministry of the cross, he says, "When 
we read the above passage, we quietly took down our Hebrew Bible 
and turned at once to Psalm xxiv. 7 — 9, where we read, Tarn "jbn fcn>i , 
and the King of glory shall come in. We ask Mr. C, then, does the 
latter part of this Psalm refer to Christ's ascension, or does it not ? 
We do not conceive that Mr. C. or any one else will have any diffi- 
culty in answering in the affirmative. Here, then, is the very verb, 



IS 



Sin with Daniel's Little Horn of the Fourth Beast. Now since 
it is undeniable, and has been acknowledged by the Church of 
God in all ages, that the Man of Sin is to be destroyed before the 
Millennium, we are necessarily obliged to conclude that the bright- 
ness of our Lord's coming, whereby St. Paul announces that its 
destruction is to be effected, does also precede the Millennium; 
and, therefore, that it is the self-same coming of the Lord 
with the clouds of heaven, predicted by Daniel in his seventh 
chapter, at the same prophetic season, viz. that of the destruction 
of the fourth beast with his lawless horn. This advent must also 
be identified with that announced in Rev. xix. 11 — 21, whereby 

Nil, used to express an ascension from earth to heaven, just as much 
as its correspondent nn«, in Dan. vii., according to Mr. Maclaurin's 
interpretation. We do not feel ourselves at all called upon to main- 
tain that interpretation any more than to refute it ; but Mr. C.'s 
refutation is a piece of unsound criticism ; and we think he would do 
well, before he criticises, to think and examine a little more accu- 
rately, or else to use a little more meekness and modesty in his asser- 
tions." 

As I happen to be informed who the Reverend author of this Re- 
view is, he will see that 1 am willing the public should be put in pos- 
session of the whole force of his objections, and therefore I have 
given his very words. In answer to his argument, I observe, that if 
Psalm xxiv. have any reference to the ascension of our Lord, it 
appears to me, as it does to Mr. Fry, in his work on the Psalms, that 
the reference to it is in ver. 3, in which the question is asked, 
" Who shall ascend TOT 'Q, to the hill of Jehovah ?" and here the 
word is rfc$, in exact accordance with the criticism which the Re- 
viewer pronounces to be unsound. The words of ver. 7, cited by the 
Reviewer, and the King of glory shall come in, (supposing our Lord's 
entrance into heaven to be here intended by the Holy Ghost,) are 
from the heavenly host who accompany him. They suppose the King, 
with his attendants, to have already ascended, and to be standing with- 
out and demanding admission. The verb, Nil, is not, then, as the Re- 
viewer ignorantly imagines, used to express ascension from earth to 
heaven, but, after that ascension, it is used to signify his entrance 
through the celestial gates. If, when he " quietly took down his Hebrew 
Bible," this Reverend Reviewer had quietly taken down his Home on 
the Psalms, he would have been preserved from such mistakes, and 
from bringing a charge against me of unsound criticism, which I thus 
throw back on himself. I shall conclude this additional Note by ob- 
serving, that the ancient Jewish commentators suppose that the 24th 
Psalm was composed on the occasion of the removal of the ark from 
the house of Obed-edom to Mount Sion, 1 Chron. xv. Now, this 
transaction, I am inclined to think, was a type, not of our Lord's as- 
cension, but of his inauguration in his kingdom at the second advent ; 
and if this be a right conjecture, the Psalm has no relation to the as- 
cension of our Lord, 



44 



the Beast and False Prophet, L e. the powers, secular and spiritual, 
of the Roman empire are finally destroyed — which events are im- 
mediately succeeded by the period of the Millennial blessedness. 

The coming of the Lord with the clouds of heaven, announced 
in Matth. xxiv. 30, Mark xiii. 26, and Luke xxi. 27, is also proved 
to be the same advent as that predicted in the former passages, 
from its being connected in time by the Evangelist Luke with the 
fulfilment of the times of the Gentiles, and the re-establishment of 
the Jewish nation ;* which events are, by the concurring voice of 
the best interpreters of prophecy, placed synchronically with the 
end of the Roman monarchy, and the commencement of the Mil- 
lennium.f Thus Mede, the father of prophetic interpretation, 
reasoned, "When," says he, " St. Luke's times of the Gentiles are 
finished, then shall be signs in the sun and moon : the Son of man 
comes also in the clouds of heaven, (ver. 27) the redemption of 
Israel (ver. 28) and the kingdom of God (ver. 31) is at hand." 
Works, Book iv. Epistle viii. 

In Rev. xiv. 14, one like the Son of Man is seen sitting upon a 
white cloud. Upon similar grounds we identify this appearance 
with the advent already so often mentioned: because it corresponds 
in time with the harvest or gathering of the elect, J and with the 
vintage or treading of the wine-press of wrath : which scene of 
vengeance is in Rev. xix. 15, placed at the advent of our Lord, 
before the Millennium, as it is in Is. lxiii. 1 — 9, and Joel iii. 1, 2, 
13, 14, connected in time with the national redemption of Israel, 
which equally takes place before the Millennium. 

Once more, when on referring to the Greek versions of the Old 
Testament on Zech. xii. 10 — 12, I find in the Septuagint (ac- 

* See Luke xxi. 24. 

f Let no one suppose that these synchronisms, in which the inter- 
preters of prophecy are agreed, are founded on arbitrary or fanciful 
principles. The one I have now mentioned may thus be proved. 
The Armageddon of St. John, Rev. xvi. 16, is evidently the same with 
the Jehoshaphat of Joel iii. 2, 12. Now in St. John's war of Arma- 
geddon, the Beast and False Prophet, or the powers secular and 
spiritual of the Roman empire, are to be destroyed, Rev. xix. 19, 20, 
and in Joel's war of Jehoshaphat, Judah and Jerusalem are to be 
restored, Joel iii. 1, 2, therefore, the restoration of Judah and the 
destruction of Rome are synchronical. This accordingly has been the 
tradition of the Jewish Church from the earliest ages, as might easily 
be proved, were there room for it, from the Jewish writings. 

% Compare Rev. xiv. 15, 16, with Matth. xiii. 30, and xxiv. 31. 



45 



cording to the reading of Justin Martyr and Ignatius) and in the 
versions of Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion, that the words 
" And they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they 
shall mourn for him as one mourneth for his only son," — " and 
the land shall mourn, every family apart)' have in the Greek so 
close a resemblance to the forms of expression used by the Apostle 
in Rev. i. 7, " and every eye shall see him, and they also which 
pierced him, and all the tribes of the earth shall wail because of 
him,*" that it is impossible for me not to conclude, that the Holy 
Spirit, in guiding his servants in these places to use such identity 
of phraseology, intended to point out to us, that one and the 

* The Greek words in Zechariah are as follows, Kcci &r&\z$ovrai 
tfoo? fAi zi; ov jls/i-vr^cctv, kcci xo^pcvrcct ssFi ccvrov &C. kcci x-oip&rat r t yr, Kocrcc 
QvXccs $v\cc;. The words of the Greek in Rev. i. 7, are Kcci o-^srett 
avrov tfccs o(pQccX/u.o; } kcci olnvi; ccvrov z^ZKivrrnrccv kcci xo'^ovrat ssr' ccvrov 
vrarut cc\ (pvkca ms ym> All the English editions of the Seventy being 
from the Vatican, for ov i\ix.zvriwra.v read «v9' av xarafp^a-avro, which, 
as Home justly observes, is unintelligible. " But Ignatius, Justin 
Martyr, and the Pachomian MS. read tgtxsnwav" See Ewing's 
Lexicon on the word Kccrog^io^ai. This remark of Mr. Ewing I 
have verified, so far as respects Justin Martyr, who, in his first 
Apology, and in his Dialogue with Trypho, has the reading sis lv 
i%iKivr'/,<rccv. I learn from the notes of my own copy of the Seventy 
(Frankfort, 1597) that Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion have the 
same words ; but I have not been able to consult their versions. 

Should it be asked why I refer to the Greek rather than the Eng- 
lish copies, to establish the identity of Zech. xii. 10 — 12, and Rev. i. 
7, my answer is, that I was long wedded, by early prejudices to the 
common opinion about our Lord's advent, and that it was by a very 
slow and cautious process of investigation, carried on through a series 
of years, that I was at length enabled to discern the truth. Xow in 
our English version the parallelism of the above two passages is 
scarcely perceptible. Our translators, by adopting the expression 
all the families of the land, in Zechariah, while in Rev. i. 7, it is all 
the tribes of the earth, have given to them features of dissimilarity 
which have no existence in the Greek versions. An English reader 
may at once understand this by substituting the words all the tribes of 
the earth, in Zechariah, for the former expression. Xow I argue that 
the Holy Spirit, in directing John to adopt the very language of the 
Seventy, has identified the two passages. I recollect well the deep 
and lively impression of surprise made on my mind, on first referring 
to these texts in the Greek Scriptures, and discovering their identity. 
It formed a new and powerful link in the chain of evidence whereby 
I was, by slow steps, feeling my way to the true doctrine of the Scrip- 
tures concerning the advent, and in these explanations the reader will 
discern the reason of my referring to the Greek rather than the Eng- 
lish Scriptures. 



46 



same event is predicted in both. But the prophecy of Zechariah, 
whereof the above words form a part, evidently relates to the 
restoration and conversion of the Jews, which confessedly take 
place before the Millennium : and thus we are led to the con- 
clusion that our Lord's advent with the clouds in Rev. i. 7, also 
precedes the Millennium, and is to be identified with the advent 
in Dan. vii. 13. 

To the whole of the foregoing passages may be added the 
words of our Lord in Matth. xxvi. 64, and Mark xiv. 62, " Here- 
after shall ye see the Son of Man sitting on the right hand of 
power and coming in the clouds of heaven." There are, it is 
true, no chronological marks in these texts, to show the precise 
period to which they refer? yet as the advent of Christ is de- 
scribed in language so nearly similar to that of the prophet 
Daniel, I may well adopt the words of Mede, to signify my un- 
alterable conviction that our Lord, in using the expressions re- 
corded in the Gospels, intended to direct the attention of the 
Jewish rulers to the prophecy of Daniel. u 1 shall never be- 
lieve," says Mede, "but that all those places of the Son of Man's 
coming and appearing in the clouds of heaven mentioned in the 
Gospels and the Apocalypse i. 7, are the same with the coming 
of the Son of Man in the clouds, prophesied by Daniel at the ex- 
tinction of the fourth Beast (chap, vii.), and that the Holy Ghost 
in the New Testament hath reference thither both for words and 
meaning." — Works, Book iv. Epistle x. 

Having thus reviewed the principal passages of prophecy, 
wherein our Lord's advent is described either chronologically 
or circumstantially, it remains that I should examine whether the 
advent spoken of in all the foregoing passages, which has been 
shown to be one and the same, be, as is the current doctrine of the 
Protestant churches of the present day, a figurative, spiritual, 
and symbolical advent, or the real, personal, and glorious coming 
of our Lord to judge the quick and the dead. 

In the New Testament there are three nouns substantive used 
to signify the advent. The first is AvozkXu^s, Apokalypsis, reve- 
lation, the second Empavsia, Epiphaneia, appearance, and the 
third, Tlagousiu, Parousia, coming or presence. 

The first of these words, AvokccXv-^is, occurs in the following 
passages ; 1 Cor. i. 7, " Waiting for the revelation of Jesus 



47 

Christ:" 2 Thes. i. 7, "At the revelation of Jesus Christ with 
his mighty angels :" 1 Pet. i. 7, "Might he found unto praise and 
honour and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ:" ver. 13, 
" Hope for the grace that is to he brought unto you at the reve- 
lation of Jesus Christ." 

The second, E«npave/a, occurs in 2 Tim. i. 10, in reference to 
the first coming of our Lord in the flesh; and in relation to his 
second coming in the following texts. — 1 Tim. vi. 14, " Until the 
appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ:" 2 Tim. iv. 1, " Who shall 
judge the quick and the dead at his appearing and his kingdom 
ver. 8, "Unto all them that love his appearing:" Tit. ii. 13, 
" Looking for that blessed hope and glorious appearing of the 
great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ." 

The third word, nccgou<nct, occurs four times in the xxiv. chapter 
of Matthew, ver. 3, " What shall be the sign of thy coming, and 
of the end of the age ?" ver. 27, " As the lightning, fyc. so shall 
the coming of the Son of Man be :" ver. 37, " As ivere the days of 
Noah, so shall the coming of the Son of Man be :" and to the same 
effect in ver. 39. 1 Cor. xv. 23, " They that are Christ's at his 
coming :" 1 Thes. ii. 19, "Are not even ye in the presence of our 
Lord Jesus at his coming ?" chap. hi. 13, "At the coming of our 
Lord Jesus Christ with all his saints :" iv. 15, "We which are 
alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord." v. 23, " Your 
whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the 
coming of our Lord Jesus Christ" 

The same word is also used in reference to the advent of our 
Lord in the following passages : 2 Thes. ii. 1, 2 Pet. hi. 4, James 
v. 7, 8, 1 John ii, 28, and to the coming of the day of the Lord 
in 2 Pet. hi. 12.* It is used for the coming or presence of Paul 

* The Reverend Reviewer already alluded to, charges me with pro- 
ducing 2 Pet. hi. 12, to prove that the coming of the day of God is a 
personal or corporeal coming, and asks, "Is it not strange that any man 
should so entirely put Ms understanding in las pocket as to be capable of 
actually adducing this passage to prove that Uaoova-ioc must always 
signify a real personal or corporeal coming ?" My answer to this 
question, so opposite in its style to Christian courtesy, is very simple. 
I wrote for men of understanding and not for school-boys. My object 
was to show, hy quoting every passage of the New Testament where 
llet^ova-icc occurs, that it always means the presence of that of which it 
is predicated. Wherever it refers to the Man Christ Jesus, or any 
other person, it means the actual presence of that human person, and in 



48 

with the churches, 2 Cor. x. 10, Philip, i. 26, ii. 12. The coming 
of Antichrist, 2 Thes. ii. 9; the coming of Stephanas and others, 
1 Cor. xvi. 17 ; the coming of Titus, 2 Cor. vii. 6, 7. 

From the review of the whole foregoing passages the unavoid- 
able inference is, that AvroxaXw^ts, Apokalypsis, and E^amoc, 
Epiphaneia, and Ua^oua-ia,^ Parousia, are indiscriminately used to 
signify the second personal advent of our Lord to judge the world : 
nor does it appear that any of these words is ever used to denote 
the spiritual or figurative revelation, or appearance, or advent, or 
presence of any object, or person which can be the object of sense. 
Thus, though AtfoxuXuiJ/is be employed to signify the discovery of 
spiritual truth to the mind, yet, to the best of my recollection, it 
is never used for the merely spiritual discovery of Christ himself 
to the mind. There is one text, Gal. i. 16, which I was inclined 
to consider as an exception to this remark ; but as we know that 
the discovery of Christ to Paul, was by a personal appearance or 
revelation (ver. 12), the text which I thought an exception does 
rather powerfully corroborate the general argument. Nor does 
the revelation of the Father spoken of by our Lord in Matt. xi. 27, 
form any exception; for the person of the Father, being that 
which no man hath or can see, the revelation of Him can only 
be spiritual. 

Next with respect to the word E^avg/a, Epiphaneia, the signi- 
fication of it as given by Schleusner is apparitio rei corporece et 
lucidce : * and he adds that it was particularly employed by the 
Greeks to denote the appearance of their gods with circumstances 
of external splendour. We have, moreover, seen that in 2 Tim. i. 
10, it is used to signify the first coming of our Lord in the flesh : 
to maintain, therefore, that when it is employed in reference to 

like manner when it relates to a day, it means the actual arrival of that 
day. And wherefore, I ask, did not this Reviewer see and understand 
that our English words, "arrival" and "coming" are used with the 
same double reference to persons, and times, and seasons ? Is it not 
usual to say, " when the new year arrives, or comes," as well as " when a 
person arrives or comes?" 

I feel truly sorry that a minister of Christ should have so sinned by 
bringing railing accusations against a person who never gave him 
offence, and who does not even know him personally. I beseech him 
to remember the judgment-seat of Christ, and as I fear that day, 1 will 
not render unto him evil for evil. 

* The appearance of a thing corporeal and resplendent. 



4? 



his future advent it may simply mean a figurative or spiritual 
coming, i. e. no coming at all, were to trifle with the sacred word, 
and to do violence to language, and to trample under foot every 
principle of certain interpretation. 

Lastly, with regard to Ila^w/a, Parousia, if it can possibly 
bear the signification of a spiritual coming, then may the coming 
of Stephanas and Fortunatus and Achaicus to the churches, men- 
tioned in the foregoing passages, have been spiritual and not per- 
sonal ; which being evidently an absurd idea, the supposed sense 
of the word from which it is deducible cannot be supported. 

Now, it will be recollected that the coming of our Lord to de- 
stroy the Man of sin in 2 Thess. ii. 8, is expressed by the union 
of two of the above nouns <rp Z7r«pa,<,si? rns fa^ourix? avrov, by the 
brightness of his coming: and if neither of them, when used 
singly, can denote a spiritual advent, much less can they when 
conjoined ; and if each of them, when employed separately, in- 
dubitably mean a personal and corporeal manifestation and 
presence, much more must they when united. So that if the 
foregoing expression do not mean the personal and glorious 
advent of our Lord, then is human language incapable of being 
interpreted on any sure and fixed principles. Since, therefore, 
we are thus driven to the conclusion, that the glorious coming of 
Christ takes place at the destruction of Antichrist ; and since this 
destruction occurs, by the unanimous consent of the church of 
God in all ages, before the Millennium ; it follows also, that 
Christ comes in glory to judge the world before the Millennium. It 
was thus that the illustrious Mede, by comparing Scripture with 
itself, was led to form the like conclusion which he expresses as 
follows : " Whatsoever Scripture speaks of a kingdom of Christ 
to be at his second appearing or at the destruction of Antichrist, 
it must needs be the same which Daniel saw should be at that 
time, and so consequently be the kingdom of 1,000 years; which 
the Apocalypse includes betwixt the beginning and ending of the 
( Great Judgment.' " Mede's Works, Book iv. Epistle xv.* 

* The vulgar notion of the day in which the secrets of men are to 
be revealed, and every hidden thing brought into judgment, Eccles. xii . 
14, and the whole principles and plan of the moral administration of 
God developed to the view of the intelligent creation for their in- 
struction and the manifestation of that Divine glory, is that it is a 
day of twelve hours, or one half of the diurnal motion of the earth.. 

e 



50 

In exact harmony with the whole of the above reasoning is the 
declaration of the Apostle in 2 Tim. iv.il, that our Lord Jesus 
Christ shall judge the quick and the dead, xurcc tjj> em^avstuv avrou 

zai T9JV fizffiXuav ctvrou, AT HIS APPEARING AND HIS KINGDOM. For 

the Scriptures tell us of no other kingdom of the Messiah than the 
one revealed in Dan. vii. 13, 14, and no other appearing (yet to 
come) than that mentioned in 2 Thess. ii. 8, for the destruction 
of Antichrist : therefore it certainly follows that his coming in 
Dan. vii. 13, and his appearing in 2 Thess. ii. 8, are "his glorious 
and personal advent to judge the quick and the dead. And since 
both these texts refer to a time preceding the Millennium, it 
follows that our Lord's coming to judge the quick and the dead is 
before the Millennium. 

I proceed now to fortify the whole of the preceding conclusions 
by one or two auxiliary arguments. I observe then that to speak 
of a future spiritual or figurative or incorporeal advent of our 
Lord to this world is directly to oppose the Scriptures : for when 
a cloud received him out of the sight of his gazing disciples, they 
were immediately assured, " This same Jesus, who is taken up 
from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen 
him go into heaven. "* To maintain then that his advent with the 
clouds, revealed in Dan. vii. 13, and so many other passages of 
Scripture, is not real and personal and corporeal, but figurative 
and spiritual and incorporeal, which is the current doctrine of the 
present day, is in plain ( -adiction to the words of the angels. 
Moreover, our Lord, in S A ^ it or as to his Divine nature, has never 
been absent from the world. " Lo, I am with you always, even 
unto the end of the age."f Indeed, as the eternal word, by 
whom all things were created and consist, J He is essentially omni- 

Mede shows from the Scriptures that it is a period of time comprehend- 
ing at least the whole 1,000 years of the judgment given to the saints 
and martyrs, Rev. xx. 4, which is manifestly the same judgment as is 
referred to in 1 Cor. vi. 2. Dan. vii. 18, 22, 27. Ps. cxlix. 6—9. Rev. 
ii. 26, 27. Now as the forty years of Israel's journeying in the wilder- 
ness is called the day of temptation, Heb. iii. 8, 9, and the whole 
period of the dispensation of Messiah is by our Lord himself called a 
day or my day, John viii. 56, we at once see that there is nothing in- 
consistent with the analogies of the Scripture language in Mede's 
view of the duration of the Day of Judgment. 

* Acts i. 11. t Matt, xxviii. 20. 

X Coloss. i. 15, 16. 



51 



present. On the other hand, to say that in his human nature he 
is to come spiritually, is in reality to deny that he possesses pro- 
per and complete humanity, which can only be present where it is 
bodily. Accordingly it may be inferred from the words of Peter 
(Acts iii. 19 — 21,) that when the time of the restitution of all 
things, spoken of by all the holy prophets, shall arrive, then the 
heavens shall no longer receive the Man Christ Jesus, or in other 
words, he shall then return to this earth in like manner as he was 
taken up, or with the clouds of heaven. Now, since the ancient 
prophets have spoken of no other restitution of all things than 
David's reign of Messiah (Ps. ii. lxxii. xcvi. xcvii. &c. &c.)-r 
Daniel's kingdom of God (chap ii. 44) — his reign of Messiah and 
his saints (chap, vii.) — Isaiah's new heaven and earth, which syn- 
chronise with restored Jerusalem (chap. lxv. 17 — 19), and since 
all these (even according to the systems of our opponents,) corre- 
spond in time with the Millennium and the kingdoms of this 
world becoming the kingdoms of our Lord and his Christ,* it 
follows that at the commencement of that period the Messiah is 
to return to this earth. 

In answer to the queries of D. D., I have thus endeavoured to 
show, First, That the principal passages of prophecy which speak 
chronologically or circumstantially of the future advent of Mes- 
siah, do one and all refer to the period immediately introductory 
to the Millennium. Secondly, That the three nouns substantive 
which are used to express the advent in the New Testament, do 
every one of them negative the idea of a spiritual coming, and do 
necessarily imply that the advent is real, personal, and corporeal. 
Thirdly, That two of these words conjoined, being used to link 
the advent to an event, which by the unanimous consent of the 
Church precedes in time the Millennium, we are driven to the 
conclusion, that the advent which synchronises with that event is 
the real and personal coming of the Lord to judge the world. 
Fourthly, That to maintain a spiritual advent, is in direct contra- 
diction to the angelic annunciation, which was uttered at the as- 
cension of our Lord. Fifthly, That to maintain a spiritual advent 
of the Man Christ Jesus, includes in it the virtual denial of his 

* Rev. xi. 15. 

e2 



52 



proper and complete humanity. Sixthly, That the return of our 
Lord to this earth, at the period of the restitution of all things, 
which must be identified with the Millennium, may be certainly 
inferred from the words of Peter in Acts iii. 19 — 21. 

To the foregoing reasoning, which is to be found in the former 
edition of this Tract, I shall now add one or two other arguments 
from the Scriptures, which demonstrate that the Day of Judgment 
commences before the Millennium, and consequently our Lord 
then comes. 

It will not be denied by our opponents, that the period called by 
our Lord, in his parables of the Tares and Wheat, and the Net 
cast into the sea, the end of the world, or age, h <rwnXua vov aiuvo§,* 
is the season when He comes to judge the world ; seeing that it is 
then that the tares are gathered from amongst the wheat and cast 
into the furnace of fire, and that the righteous are to shine forth 
as the sun in the kingdom of their Father. This period is called 
also the Harvest, ®i£urpos. Until then, it is manifest, that there 
is to be no work of judgment of such a nature, as to distinguish 
between and separate the wicked from the just, and no destruction 
of the wicked. But no sooner does the Seventh Apocalyptic 
Trumpet sound, than it is declared in the heavenly acclamations, 
that the wrath of God is come, and the time of the dead to be 
judged, and to give reward to the prophets, and servants, and 
fearers of God, and to destroy the destroyers of the earth, that is, 
the wicked.f It necessarily follows, therefore, that this is the 
time called by our Lord, the Harvest, and the end of the age, when 
the tares are to be burned and the righteous are to receive their 
reward. But as the sounding of the Seventh Trumpet is admitted 
by all interpreters to be before the Millennium or reign of Christ, 
which indeed is demonstrable from the language of Rev. xi. 15, 
and since it is also, as we have now seen, the time of the harvest 
and end of the age, it follows, that the harvest and end of the age 
precede the Millennium. 

This conclusion receives the most express confirmation from the 
vision in Rev. xiv. 14, of one like the Son of Man sitting on a 
cloud with a sharp sickle ; for in the next verse it is said, that the 



* Matt. xiii. 39, and 49. 



+ Rev. xi. 15 — 18. 



harvest of the earth is ripe, and the earth is forthwith reaped. 
Now this act of reaping the earth is before the vintage, which 
follows to ver. 19 and 20 ; and from ch, xix. 15, compared with 
xx. 1 — 4, it is plain that the vintage and treading of the Wine 
Press are before the Millennium, therefore the harvest and the end 
of the age are also before the Millennium, 



APPENDIX. 



No. I. 

Having said in the body of the Preface, that it seems to us that 
not one sign of the approaching advent remains unaccomplished, 
it may be asked by some, What these signs are? To this I 
answer, that there are many signs. First, The shaking of all the 
nations, and of every throne in Christendom to their foundations ; 
which, with the exception of our own happy country,* has been 
effected within the last forty years. These convulsions seem to 
have been the fulfilment of the prophecy of signs in the sun, moon, 
and stars, predicted in Luke xxi. 25. Second, The tumults of the 
nations have been succeeded by a period of peace and worldliness, 
corresponding to our Lord's description of the condition of the 
world when he shall appear, Matth. xxiv. 37 — 39. Third, A 
preaching of the Gospel of unequalled magnitude and extent, 
among all nations, apparently corresponding in character with 
that announced by our Lord in Matth. xxiv. 14, as immediately 
preceding the end. Fourth, Such movements among the Jews as 
indicate the period of their conversion to be near at hand. 
Fifth, The downfall of the Ottoman empire, which all the inter- 
preters of prophecy connect with the events of the last times. 
Sixth, The going forth of three unclean spirits; 1st, the spirit of 
infidelity and atheism out of the mouth of the Dragon ; 2d, the 
spirit of anarchy and despotismf out of the mouth of the Beast, or 
secular Roman empire ; 3d, the spirit of Popery out of the mouth 
of the False Prophet, which, as is discernible to all spiritual 

* This exception no longer exists. It has pleased God in mercy to 
spare us the evils of bloodshed and civil war, but the great revolution 
effected in this country during the last seven years, and in the midst 
of which we still are, leaves what yet remain of our ancient institu- 
tions, and the monarchy itself, like the scattered and trembling pillars 
of an edifice partially overthrown by an earthquake. 

f Anarchy and Despotism are the same principle, viz. the lust of 
lawless power, the one working in the multitude and the other in 
kings. 



persons, are now, according to Rev. xvi. 13, 14, actually at work 
preparing the kings and people for the war of Armageddon;* 
just before which war, Rev. xvi. 15, the note of the advent is 
given. Seventh, The concurring testimony of the greater number 
of writers on prophecy in the present day, that the prophetic 
period of 1260 years ended in the year 1792; and, consequently, 
that we are far advanced towards the completion of Daniel's 
1335 days, at the end of which the Millennium is supposed to 
commence. 



No. II. 

Since this Tract was sent to the press, I have seen an article on 
prophecy in the Edinburgh Theological Magazine, at the head of 
which is placed my Pamphlet on the prophetic arrangement of 
Mr. Irving and Mr. Frere ; and yet the reviewer, after elevating 
my humble work to so conspicuous and honourable a place, 
strangely enough tells his readers that he has no intention to 
enter into the merits of my performance, or " to trouble his readers 
with any account of its contents" In other words, he uses my 
Pamphlet simply as a sort of sign-post, to draw the attention of the 
readers of the magazine to his own speculations. But it seems to 
me, that he might better have placed one of the Pamphlets of 
Mr. Mason of Wishawtown at the head of his Dissertation, as his 
article contains a much greater portion of that gentleman's 
lucubrations than mine. This modern practice of reviewers, 
(introduced first, I believe, by the Edinburgh Review,) of using 
the names of books of which they intend to say nothing, simply as 
the medium of sending forth their own speculations, seems to me 
to be reprehensible, and scarcely consistent with Christian candour. 
It is as if a painter were to draw us by an advertisement to see 
the picture of some one in which we might feel an interest, 
and were, instead of it, to exhibit a likeness of himself, about 
which we might care nothing at all. 

* All the modern interpreters of prophecy seem to concur in the 
opinion, that the sixth vial is poured out on the empire of the Turks 
or Ottomans ; and it is apparent that the war of Armageddon is in 
some way or other connected with the affairs of Turkey, as the pre- 
parations for it are mentioned under the sixth vial. 



57 



Passing over what the reviewer says in reference to " the present 
writers on prophecy," and the severe censures he levels against 
them, not always, I fear, undeserved, I proceed to consider his 
attack upon the Millenarians, whose scheme he ranks among 
" the wilder fancies which sully and degrade some very popular 
productions not otherwise destitute of merit." 

I shall begin what I have to offer in answer to his attack upon 
us, by telling this writer, that the first qualification of one who 
sits in the chair of criticism, particularly objurgatory criticism, 
ought to be knowledge — but of this, in relation to the scheme 
which he condemns, he exhibits no evidence. He commences his 
observations by repeating in substance, three times over, the ob- 
jection of Nicodemus, " How can these things he ?" — To such 
questions our answer is short and simple — In the mount of the 
Lord it shall be seen'* how these things can be. He next supposes 
that we hold the general conflagration at the commencement of 
the Millennium. Now I will tell him that we hold no such thing. 
The conflagration of Sodom was not general, with respect to 
the promised land, of which it was a part, (see Gen. xiii. 10.) 
Nor do w r e believe that the conflagration which we learn from 
Dan. vii. 11, and Rev. xix. 20, is to destroy the body, or territories 
of the fourth beast, the mystic Sodom, is to be a general one, ex- 
tending over the whole earth. It is probable, however, that the 
fire of our Lord's coming, while it destroys the beast, may have a 
purifying efficacy over the atmosphere of the whole earth ; thus 
changing the heavens, and fitting the earth for its new state of 
beatitude. There is nothing in this contrary either to Scripture 
or sound philosophy. The reviewer next brings forward what 
may truly be called the crux of the millenarian system, viz. the 
loosing of Satan after the 1000 years. And here I will fairly 
acknowledge that he nonplusses us. I remark, however, that the 
real question is not how we can make this moral phenomenon to 
consist with human reason, and carnal notions of congruity, but 
whether it be actually revealed? It is a great mystery that sin 
entered heaven, and hurled from then* celestial thrones some of its 
principalities ; but it is revealed, and I feel in myself, and see in 
this reviewer, the effects of this celestial revolution before man 



* Genesis xxii. 14. 



56 



had a being, and therefore, though it be obscure, I believe it. In 
like manner it is revealed that there shall be a last defection 
among the nations living under the new Jerusalem dispensation ; 
and I have before my eyes the fact of a similar defection among 
the children of. Israel, in the matter of the golden calf, only a few 
weeks after the awful displays from mount Sinai, at the giving of 
the law. Finding this deep mystery revealed in the word of God, 
I with simplicity believe it ; not daring, as many do, to set my own 
vain carnal reasonings and ignorance against the testimony and 
wisdom of God. But I shall here again tell the reviewer, that he 
utterly mistakes our scheme (whatever some may have said, for 
whose crudities we are not responsible,) in supposing that the 
apostate nations of Gog and Magog, can only be the wicked 
raised from the dead. 

The next mistake of this reviewer, (who is manifestly unac- 
quainted with the writings of Mede,) is his supposing that our 
doctrine interposes between Christ's coming and the judgment, at 
least a thousand years. We, on the contrary, believe the whole 
thousand years to be included in the judgment, which begins with 
the resurrection of the just, and the destruction of Antichrist; 
and ends with the destruction of Gog and Magog, and the uni- 
versal resurrection of the human race. We believe, that in the 
majestic procession of the various acts of this drama of judgment, 
which, like all the other works of God, is not to be over in 
a day, but to have various progressions and germinations, the 
glorious righteousness and spotless holiness of God are to be mani- 
fested before the eyes, and for the instruction unto righteousness 
of all creation. 

The reviewer next reasons against our views of a resurrection of 
the just before the unjust; and asserts, that the doctrine of the 
Bible is, that the resurrection of the just will be the destruction of 
death, and the end of all things. This, indeed, is bold assertion, 
in the very teeth of Rev. xx. 4, 5. As for his argument from 
1 Cor. xv. 23, 24, it will be time for us to bend to its force, when 
he shall have critically examined, and luminously set before us 
the exact meaning of the Greek text, particularly of the particles 
of time ivrura, and urec taken in mutual connexion. I observe, 
that the last of them, when it occurs in the same sentence with 
the first, as in 1 Cor. xii. 28, has the same force, and a like sig- 



5h ? 



nification; therefore, as the first in chap. xv. 23, means an in- 
terval, (as we already know,) of eighteen centuries, so may the 
second, or ura in ver. 24, signify a long period of at least 1000 
years. Besides, that it signifies sequence in time, not immediate, 
but considerably distant, is plain from its being employed in 
Mark iv. 28, to express the intervals between the appearance of 
the green blade of the corn and the ear, and also the full ripe 
gram. 

When, on the other hand, identity in time is meant, the Greek 
particle used, is not E/r« but ron, as every one knows. And even 
Macknight, whom no one will suspect of Millenarian views, but 
who is generally an exact critic and expositor of the letter, sees 
that the words in ver. 23 and 24, imply a succession in the order 
of the resurrection. He renders the first clause of ver. 23, " But 
every one «v tu ilm ruypccn in Ms proper band; for <raypc& denotes 
a band of soldiers, a cohort, a legion." And he adds, " Seeing 
the Apostle affirms, ver. 22, that all men shall be made alive by 
Christ, and in this verse, that every one shall be made alive in his 
own band; also seeing we are told 1 Thess. iv. 15, that the 
righteous who are alive at the coming of Christ, and who are to 
be changed, ver. 51, of this chapter, shall not anticipate them 
that sleep, it is probable, as was observed in the preceding note, 
that they will not be changed till the righteous are raised. Their 
change, however, will happen before the resurrection of the 
wicked, who, as they are to awake to shame and everlasting com- 
tempt, will be raised, I think, last of all." To the above rea- 
soning of Macknight, let me add only one observation more from 
myself. Since it is declared, that every one of the dead will be 
raised in his own band, rccy^u, and since the righteous and 
wicked are buried promiscuously, it necessarily follows, that they 
must be raised, not at the same moment, but at distinct and suc- 
cessive points of time ; and the idea of succession being thus 
forced upon us, we conclude there must be two resurrections, one 
of the just, the other of the unjust; and what is the interval 
of time which shall separate the two, we can learn only from the 
word of God. 

Our Lord himself also speaks, in Luke xx. 35, of the resur- 
rection, in such language, as to imply the truth of the doctrine 



60 



we have endeavoured to prove. His words are, as the clause has 
been strictly rendered ; They which shall be accounted worthy to 
obtain that age, xai rys <tv<x<rrcc<ncos ms zx, vsx^v and of the resur- 
rection from amongst the dead, shall neither marry nor be given 
in marriage.* It is quite evident that he here speaks of the resur- 
rection, as a privilege peculiar to some, and not to all. In like 
manner, in Luke xiv. 14, he mentions a peculiar resurrection of 
the just, avravrobob'/iffircu <rot sv a'JOLerrocaSi ruv ^ixctiuv • and let the 
reader here mark well the change of expression in the Greek. 
The meaning of these words is not, as in the former case, " thou 
shalt be rewarded at the resurrection from amongst the just" 
but " at the resurrection of the just" i. e. the whole body of the 
just. So also St. Paul, when in Philip, iii. 11, he mentions, that 
to attain to the resurrection is the great object of his ambition, 
uses not the expression Ets mv ava<rra<rtv ruv vsxgav which would 
signify, " to the resurrection of the dead" (generally) ; but his 
words are E^ <n?v i%avot<rra<nv rut vtxgw to the resurrection from 
amongst the dead," 

Now, seeing that the just rise when Christ comes, and the rest 
of the dead, together with all who die during the Millennial 
reign, not till the end of the Millennium, it follows, that with 
respect to them, the last enemy will not be destroyed till the end 
of that dispensation. The objection of this reviewer, founded on 
the words, " the last enemy that shall be destroyed, is death," 
is thus deprived of all its strength, and like his former argu- 
ments, is proved to be founded on ignorance of the system which 
he opposes. 

Having thus examined the weight of the reviewer's arguments, 
against the Millenarian scheme, in rather a hasty manner, I pro- 
ceed to remark, that his reasoning all proceeds upon a foundation, 
which I believe to be utterly unsound. He supposes that there 
are several advents of Christ mentioned in the New Testament, 
and particularly, that he was announced as coming at the de- 

* While I am writing these remarks, the words of the twelve, Acts 
vi. 3, occur to my recollection, as affording an example of the same 
Greek form of expression, E^^xs^a^Qg ow, abzXQoi, avdga$ i\ \>[am 
^.a^rv^ovfAiious " Look ye out from amongst you, brethren, 

seven men of honest report." See also Rev. v. 9. 



61 



struction of Jerusalem. Now, I know of no text which speaks of 
his coming at that catastrophe, and however general this idea 
may be among modern expositors, I believe it to be altogether 
destitute of Scriptural foundation. As for the text, Matt. xvi. 
28, so learned a person as this reviewer, certainly cannot be igno- 
rant, that the ancient church gave it an entirely different explana- 
tion. This reviewer either is, or ought, before he ascended the 
chair of criticism, to have made himself acquainted with what 
the eminently profound and learned Bishop Horsley has written 
on the subject of our Lord's second coming, in his first volume of 
sermons, and he cannot but know, or ought to know, that the 
bishop also entirely rejects the fancy of a coming of the Lord at 
the destruction of Jerusalem. 

I have now nearly, though not quite, done with this reviewer. 
He closes with some admonitions to the MiUenarians, which are 
written in a tone of high authority, and I shall close with some 
advice to the Critics. 

From the style of this reviewer, I should infer that he is a 
country minister, more acquainted with the divines of the last 
age, that with modern books. He is evidently a man of piety 
and worth ; who has, so far as his opportunities have enabled 
him, obtained a very creditable degree of knowledge on the sub- 
ject of prophecy : but he has overrated his attainments, which 
certainly are not of that extensive and profound nature as to 
qualify him for the difficult task he has undertaken. He has 
written a review against the MiUenarians, and has manifestly 
never read the writings of Joseph Mede, the most luminous ex- 
pounder of that system. And this is almost as if a person were 
to write an essay on the poetry of England, without having read 
Milton. In his zeal to overthrow our doctrines, and in ignorance 
of their real nature, he has called them hard names. Now, hard 
names and arguments are different things ; and I would recom- 
mend it to him, the next time he sits down on the throne of cri- 
ticism, to abstain from every thing of this nature, and not to 
charge us with holding wild and degrading fancies and absurdities, 
till he has proved it. Nothing is so strong as meekness; and 
when a man begins to attach a string of epithets to the opinions 
he opposes, I always suspect that he is weak in real argument. 
Finally, let him beware lest in denying the plain literal meaning 

/ 



62 



of the promises of the Lord's second coming, he should be 
chargeable with exalting his own carnal reason above the oracles 
of the living God, and of unwittingly strengthening the hands of 
those scoffers, who say, " Where is the promise of his coming ? " 
2 Pet. iii. 4. 



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